Harry Potter and the Mysterious Sibling
by ScaleneGalleons
Summary: Sister? Harry had always lived alone. But not anymore... but also not before? What's going on? Brother? Melanie couldn't remember anything before suddenly appearing into the life of one Harry Potter. But... she remembers everything about living with Harry and the Dursleys. :Rated T just to be safe. AU later on:
1. Melanie

**{A/N: First fanfic, don't be mean. The characters might be OOC, but I'll try my best. Also, the POV is going to be third person and be focused on both Harry and Melanie. Also, if you recognize some parts directly from the book, it probably is from the book, although it probably will have been altered slightly.**

**Disclaimer: I am not J.K. Rowling, just in case you were wondering, nor will I ever turn into J.K. Rowling at any point in my life. If on the off chance that I do and pigs start flying, you will be informed.}**

Years had passed since one Albus Dumbledore had left Privet Drive, and the house of Mr. and Mrs. Dursley indeed showed signs of more than one child living in their house, despite the couple's best efforts to hide it. The inhabitants of the house included Petunia Dursley, Vernon Dursley, their son - Dudley Dursley – and the two Potter siblings.

Harry Potter woke up to the unexpected light shining from somewhere. _Is there a crack in the door?_ he wondered. How else would light have gotten into his little cupboard?

But as Harry awakened fully, he saw that he wasn't in his little cupboard; he was in Dudley's second bedroom. Littered around the room were toys, broken from the boy's temper and carelessness, and books, abandoned without a second thought.

"I'm dreaming, aren't I?" Harry questioned aloud. He distinctly remembered falling asleep on his tiny cot inside his 'room'. While pondering the sudden scenery change, he turned to his left. "Now I'm sure I'm dreaming." There was a girl lying there.

Harry's talking seemed to have wakened the girl, who yawned and stretched. She also seemed confused about where she was, turning around only to stifle a scream when she saw Harry.

"Who are you?"

"Who are you?" Harry shot back. After all, this girl was in his 'home'.

She looked around the room in confusion, causing her red, wavy hair to become even messier. After a moment, she looked back. "I… I think… my name is Melanie Potter?"

"Potter?"

"Why's that so surprising?" Melanie asked.

"I'm Harry Potter."

"Does that mean we're related?"

"Maybe, but-"

There was a sudden loud knock on the bedroom door. Aunt Petunia's voice, shrill and strict, interrupted their discussion.

"Up! Get up! Now!" The door shook with every knock. "Are you up yet?"

"Yes," both Potters replied.

"Good. Girl, get out here and look after the bacon. Don't you dare let it burn; everything needs to be perfect for Duddy's birthday." Aunt Petunia's voice softened sickeningly on the last two words, prompting Harry to feign being sick.

"What did you say?"

"Nothing, Aunt Petunia."

"Boy, you get down here and set the table." The two siblings waited until the Aunt Petunia hit the creaky step at the bottom of the stairs, though how Melanie even knew of that step puzzled her.

"As I was saying before-" Harry began, only to be interrupted by Melanie.

"We'll talk about this later; we better get down for Duddy's birthday." Harry grinned as Melanie rolled her eyes while saying 'Duddy'. If they were indeed siblings, it'd be nice to have somebody with a sense of humour.

"Comb your hair!" Uncle Vernon barked at Harry once he stepped into the kitchen. Uncle Vernon nodded with approval at Melanie's braids, making Harry stare at him in astonishment. Wasn't he going to complain that the braids made her look like a five-year-old or something?

After Harry finished putting all the plates and utensils on the table, he hovered around a chair awkwardly. He had always cooked everything before. A sudden barrage of memories: he saw that Melanie cooked while he cleaned. As if to prove this fact, the small scar from a burn that he had gotten on his hand faded slowly until it was gone completely.

"Well, what are you waiting for? An invitation?" Uncle Vernon chuckled at his own joke. At Harry's look, Vernon gestured at the chair that the young boy was standing behind.

"Er… I'll just go see how, um, Melanie's doing," Harry said, walking over to where the stove was. He was astonished to see a plate of at least a dozen friend eggs done perfectly and another plate of bacon. "You, er, cook really fast."

Melanie turned around, dropping the egg she was holding into the pan. "You surprised me!" She diligently reached her hand into the pan and picked out the shell pieces.

"Use a fork!" Harry handed her the mentioned object.

"I don't need one." Never in her recently gained "memories" had she ever been burned. _Probably burn-resistant,_she thought with a smirk at Harry's surprised look. A few seconds later, she was done.

After she placed the two plates on the table and everybody got a plate of food, Dudley looked up from counting his birthday presents.

"Thirty-six. That's two less than last year."

_How unbelievably spoiled are you, you little brat?_ Melanie scowled at him, which, thankfully, went unnoticed. Throughout her "memories", she recalled many times that Dudley had beat up her brother and teased both of them mercilessly. Not exactly somebody she wanted to be friends with.

Harry, on the other hand, wolfing down food to avoid having his plate overturned along with the table during one of Dudley's tantrums.

"Darling, you haven't counted Auntie Marge's present. It's here, under this big one from Mummy and Daddy," Petunia comforted in an adoring tone.

"All right, thirty-seven then." By this point, Dudley's face was turning red with anger.

Aunt Petunia also sensed the danger and assured Dudley that he'll have received two more by the end of today. Shockingly, Dudley had to concentrate hard for a moment before finally deducing that he'd have 39 presents. Melanie knew that he was rather thick, but this was ridiculous.

"Crisis averted," Harry muttered, much to Melanie's amusement.

_Oh dear… _she thought, looking at Dudley. _I'm related to some sort of whale-pig hybrid, aren't I?_

Unaware of the two Potter's stifled snickers, Dudley started opening gifts to reveal a racing bike, a video camera, a remote control airplane, sixteen new computer games, and a VCR. Melanie watched, mentally calculating how much money that would all cost. Of course, their family was quite rich but spent it all on spoiling Dudley.

Never had Melanie or Harry received anything worth mentioning for their birthday. The best Harry had gotten was enough money to buy a pack of gum at a dollar shop, and the best Melanie had received was some hair bands and some small clips. The reasoning behind this was that their birthday being on the same day resulted in them having to get twice the amount of presents as Dudley, though that was clearly a lie. Now that Melanie was ready to remember, she seemed to remember everything all at once, which was rather disorientating.

Aunt Petunia answered the phone, then put it down a minute later looking angry and worried.

"Bad news, Vernon. Mrs. Figg's broken her leg. She can't take them." She nodded in the sibling's direction.

Despite the fact that the old lady had broken her leg, Harry couldn't help but smile a little. Maybe he'd be able to go to the zoo with Dudley.

As Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia discussed where the two would be put, Melanie could feel herself getting more and more angry. The way they talked made her feel insignificant. She tuned out what they were saying to think about the recently acquired memories.

While she'd been cooking, she started to remember some things that were related wherever she looked. The pan, which she had used countless times to make meals. The table, which Dudley had once pounded so hard in a moment of anger that the legs had collapsed.

Despite how lucid and _real_ these memories were, she couldn't help but feel that they weren't hers. If she had indeed lived here for the past decade, why couldn't she shake off the feeling that she'd only recently joined this 'family'. Everything that 'happened' was clear but not clear. Just thinking about this gave her a headache, which was worsened when Dudley started wailing that he didn't want either of the two siblings with him because they'd ruin everything.

The doorbell rang and her head gave a nasty throb.

"Are you okay?" Harry whispered. Melanie nodded, but regretted it instantly as the room spun around her.

Half an hour later, Harry was caught between joy at being included for once in the fun, and worry for Melanie. Memories had shown him how she stood up for him and vice versa whenever there was trouble. Harry didn't understand what was happening and how he started to remember new things that he certainly hadn't remembered before this morning. He still had a faint memory of sleeping in the cupboard under the stairs, but there was no indication of that.

One the way out of the car, he was pulled aside by Uncle Vernon.

"I'm warning you now, boy - any funny business, anything at all - and you'll be in that room of yours from now until Christmas."

"I'm not going to do anything, honestly." Uncle Vernon only scoffed in disbelief and let him go. Harry had been expecting this reaction; nobody ever believed that he hadn't done something on purpose.

One time, during first grade, he remembered seeing some girls picking on Melanie. A sudden gust of wind blew branches and leaves into their hair and face, leaving Melanie clean and unscratched. From her startled and confused look, the Dursleys had deemed her innocent, accusing Harry. He couldn't even remember how many times Aunt Petunia had tried to cut his hair only to have it grow back the next day in it's same unruly manner.

Harry couldn't stop the optimistic feeling that nothing was going to go wrong today, even declaring it quietly to himself. He should've known that he'd just jinx it.

The sky was a clear blue with a few clouds crawling lazily across the blue landscape. Because it was a Saturday, the zoo was crowded with families eager to see various animals. The weather was warm and the Dursleys bought Dudley and his friend, Piers, large ice creams. Because the vendor selling the ice cream had asked Harry and Melanie what they wanted, they each got a small ice pop. Melanie had abandoned hers when it worsened her headache, giving it to Harry.

Harry had the best morning he'd had in a long time. Of course, he'd thought that, jinxing the day twice as strongly now.

After a rather greasy lunch, they went to the reptile house. It was cool and dark in the, a welcoming break from the sun shining down on them. Of course, Dudley and Piers wanted to see the huge, poisonous cobras and the immense pythons. Dudley ran around the place, quickly finding the largest snake, which was asleep.

"Make it move," Dudley whined to his father, who tapped the glass.

"Do it again." No reaction.

"This is boring," Dudley moaned, with an expression that resembled one of the monkeys that they had seen before lunch.

Harry, on the other hand, moved in front of the tank and stared intently at the snake. Suddenly, the snake opened its eyes. It slithered to the glass and raised its head so that its eyes were level with Harry's.

It winked.

Harry stared in disbelief. Feeling rather foolish, he winked back.

The snake smiled, best as a snake could, and jerked its head towards Uncle Vernon and Dudley. It gave Harry a look that said: "I get that all the time."

Harry felt sympathetic and murmured, "It must be really annoying." That prompted the snake to nod, and Harry asked, "Where do you come from?"

The snake "pointed" with its tail to a sign next to the glass tank.

_Boa Constrictor__, Brazil__._

"Was it nice there?" Harry asked politely. The snake's tail "pointed" to the sign again, and Harry read on.

_Bred in captivity._

"I see," Harry said. Before he could go on, there was a deafening shout. "DUDLEY! MR. DURSLEY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT'S DOING!"

Dudley waddled over and pushed Harry down. Caught by surprise, Harry stumbled into Melanie.

What happened next was so sudden that nobody could confirm what exactly happened. One second, Piers and Dudley were pressed up against the glass and the next, they lurched forwards, screaming, only to be yanked back by Mr. Dursley.

Harry sat up and gasped; the glass front of the snake's tank had vanished. The snake uncoiled itself from the fake branch in the tank and slithered onto the floor, heading for the exit. People in the reptile house screamed and started running around, only adding to the chaos.

"Brazil, here I come... Thanksss amigo," the snake whispered to Harry.

"Harry?" Melanie whispered, finally free of the headache now that all the memories had been securely remembered.

Everybody was in shock. The glass wasn't shattered, simply gone. Was there a secret lever that had been pushed that lifted the glass up? Was the glass melted suddenly? And, perhaps even stranger, was the glass swallowed by the snake?

Melanie could swear that she saw red when Piers said, "Harry was talking to it, weren't you Harry?" with a malicious grin.

"What, you think that Harry vanished a piece of glass?" Melanie shot back, shutting Piers up. "I bet you think that Harry somehow used a musical instrument, charmed the snake and convinced it to swallow the glass whole."

However, Uncle Vernon seemed to think that's exactly what happened. After Piers was gone, Uncle Vernon turned to Harry and Melanie. "Into your room, NOW."

That was what they were waiting; a chance to talk. The two wasted no time before scrambling into their room.

"Now, we can talk," Melanie said.

**{A/N: Anyways, that's the first bit. Next time, it'll probably be them talking and the letters. I'd like at least one review before I continue, just to make sure that somebody's reading. I'll probably update soon regardless. But please read and review. *starts begging*}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	2. The Letters

**{A/N: Second chapter. Forgive me if some of these chapters are covering what we already know. I need to get through first year following the pattern of the books. I'll start branching out more in the later books.**

**Disclaimer: I am not J.K. Rowling. Just so you know.}**

The two sat there in silence, trapped in their own thoughts and memories.

Melanie was trying to make sense of what happened. She was certain that, when she woke up this morning, she was not Melanie Lily Potter. What happened could've been passed off as morning grogginess, if Harry hadn't gone through the exact same thing. Two times the witnesses of the strange, sudden memories. Something was wrong.

Harry felt overjoyed and guilty. Finally, there was somebody he could talk to without having to censor his thoughts and feelings. Throughout his recently 'remembered' memories, there were plenty of times where the two siblings had defended each other at from… well, from people in general.

It seemed that nobody else was brave enough to shield two kids from bullies although Melanie had done so countless times for others. His guilt came from the fact that he was happy that somebody else was condemned to living with the Dursleys. Harry had first-hand experience on how cruel they could be and yet he felt _happy_ that somebody else was suffering with him.

Finally, Harry spoke. "Have you… remembered?"

Melanie nodded, adding, "It feels so real. But I can't be your sister; I barely know you!"

"Actually, we're technically twins 'cause we were born on the same day and all that."

"Fine. 'But I can't be your twin; I barely know you!'" Melanie fixed, rolling her eyes. "Happy?"

"I still kind of remember… before."

"What do you mean before?"

"Well… before today I supposed. When I was alone," Harry muttered. "That little cupboard under the stairs was my bedroom."

"They put you in that little cupboard when Duddy had a _second bedroom!_" Melanie looked murderous. Harry shivered, thankful that she was his sister and not his enemy. She breathed heavily, sounding rather like a wild animal that had been running for days.

Eventually, she calmed down and said, "We should just sleep. We'll have as long as it takes for Uncle Vernon to think something rational, which might take decades, if not centuries." With that, she crawled into bed and was asleep within a few minutes.

Harry felt reluctant to go to sleep. What if he woke up the next morning inside his cupboard? If everything was just a dream, he didn't think that he would be able to stand it._I'll just stay awake and make sure that Mel doesn't disappear or something. Like the glass._However, he was exhausted from the day's trekking about the zoo and fell asleep almost as quickly as Melanie did.

~.~.~.~.~

Weeks passed (three to be exact) before their "grounding" ended. During that time, they were only allowed out of their rooms for school, mealtimes and bathroom breaks (which they only had 2 each day).

The two siblings didn't mind that much for this meant that they had all the evenings on weekdays to discuss their current "problem" without having to do chores. However, on the weekends, Melanie and Harry were put to work. They'd hoped that the grounding meant time to relax on the weekends, but Aunt Petunia seemed reluctant to lose two workers.

With all their discussions, they were able to confirm that: yes, their memories were the same and could be confirmed by Dudley in all the ones which he was present; yes, they were twins; yes, everybody they encountered knew who Melanie was, and not just Harry; and, last of all, yes, they both felt that something was wrong.

The end of their grounding meant one thing: more chores. As it was the summer break, they spent all day caring for the gardens at both the front and back of the house, cleaning every surface inside the house, and vacuuming every week.

"This is so dull," Melanie complained. The only response was Harry's 'get-used-to-it' look. In fact, Melanie had it slightly better. Although most of their chores were combined, there were some things that only Harry had to do.

While Melanie's list consisted of all their combined chores and cooking, Harry's included tidying up all the bedrooms, washing the dishes, sorting Uncle Vernon's papers and laundry. He had no idea why the Dursleys seemed to favour Melanie a little, but he never complained. After all, it was a considerably smaller list of chores compared to what he would've had to do alone.

Another benefit was that Melanie seemed to be able to intimidate Dudley. Of course, her temper was even worse than Harry's but she was a lot scarier when angry. Her hazel eyes narrowed sternly, hands crossed in front of her chest or on her hips. With a few impatient taps of her foot, the spoiled boy would either apologize or retreat.

And that was only when she was annoyed, not angry!

A clear example of this favouring was that while Harry's clothes were mainly hand-me-downs from Dudley, Melanie got bought clothes that she chose instead of having to take Aunt Petunia's and get them cut to fit her. Of course, there was no tolerance of clothes that exceeded their agreed cheap limit, but it was a step up from Harry's situation.

A few days before the two sibling's birthday, mail came. They heard the mail slot open and the small thump as the letters landed on the floor just in front of the door.

"Get the mail, Dudley," Uncle Vernon ordered.

"Make Harry get it."

"Get the mail, Harry."

"Make Dudley get it."

"I'll get it," Melanie snapped, if only to end the bickering that would obviously result in Harry having to go get the mail. She hit Dudley's Smeltings stick back at him, shooting him a glare for trying to hit her.

Four things lay on the floor: a postcard from Uncle Vernon's sister, Marge, who was on vacation, a brown envelope which appeared to be a bill, and two near identical letters, one for Harry and the other for Melanie. She took the small stack of letters and put the two for them at the bottom. They'd never gotten mail before, but this was obviously addressed to them.

_Mr. H. Potter_

_The Smallest Bedroom_

_4 Privet Drive_

_Little Whinging_

_Surrey_

The other was the same except that it was addressed to _Ms. M. Potter._The envelope was thick and heavy, made of something that looked like parchment, and the address was written in green ink.

_No stamp,_ Melanie remarked as she ran her thumb over the purple wax seal with a coat of arms.

"Hurry up, girl!" Uncle Vernon's voice stopped her from opening the letter. "What are you doing, checking for letter bombs?"

"How witty. Maybe you should become a comedian," Melanie scoffed quietly.

She hurried into the kitchen and handed Uncle Vernon the two normal letters. Under the table, she handed Harry his envelope. They both slowly pried up the wax seal. So entranced by their letters, neither Potter noticed Dudley get out of his chair and stand behind them.

"Dad! Dad, they've got something!"

Quickly, Harry tried to unfold his letter but it was jerked out of his hands by Uncle Vernon. He tried to peer at Melanie's letter but it was taken by Aunt Petunia.

"That's mine!" Harry said, reaching to take it back. Melanie was running around Aunt Petunia, who was turning in circles and holding the letter up above her head.

"Who'd be writing to you?" Uncle Vernon's face suddenly seemed to change colours. Red with anger, green with nausea and finally a pale gray.

"P-P-Petunia!" he gasped out. Aunt Petunia read the letter she was holding, _Melanie's letter!_ Harry thought, and she screeched.

"Vernon! Oh my goodness!" Suddenly, she thrust the letter as far as she could, as if afraid that it would bite her or something.

Melanie stood still, watching as Dudley and Harry both yelled at Uncle Vernon to let them read the letter. This ended up with a lot of yelling and the two boys being thrown out into the hall.

"I'll, um, just go." She didn't want to test Uncle Vernon more than necessary.

In the hall, she saw that the two boys were fighting over who would listen at the keyhole. As Harry pressed himself to the ground, Melanie contemplated when she saw.

A wax seal; who still did that? Coupled along with the odd "paper" that had been used, it seemed as though somebody extremely old had sent them the letter. _The wax seal, what was on it? It was divided into four parts… Yes, there were animals, around a letter. H was it?_

Despite all her best memory recalling techniques (a.k.a. closing her eyes and telling both boys to be quiet so she could think) she couldn't remember what the four animals were.

That evening, after Uncle Vernon had come and insisted that the letter was addressed to them by mistake ("NO IT WASN'T IT HAD MY NAME ON IT," Harry insisted), Melanie told Harry what she remembered.

"Wax seal, parchment, and H on the seal. What does that mean?"

"How am I supposed to know?" Harry was fuming that he didn't get his letter.

"I did see one thing from the letter. It was only the beginning of the word, though: Hog."

He stared at her in disbelief. "Did we get a letter from a butcher or something?"

The next morning, everybody was unusually quiet. Dudley was in shock; he'd screamed, punched, kicked and broken some more of his toys, but he still wasn't allowed to read the letter. Uncle Vernon was rather jumpy that day, practically falling out of his chair every time he heard something. Aunt Petunia's beady eyes were darting around the room as if she was looking for a way to escape.

When the mail arrived, Dudley was told to go get it. They heard his stomping gradually get quieter as he got further down the hall. There was a brief pause, then a shout. "There's two more! 'Mr. H. Potter, the Smallest Bedroom, 4 Privet Drive –"

With a cry, Uncle Vernon ran down the hallway and seized the mail. Despite Harry's best efforts, he was unable to take the mail from Dudley or, afterwards, Uncle Vernon.

"Go upstairs!" Uncle Vernon roared at Dudley, Harry, and Melanie, who was still in the kitchen, astonished to see how quickly things got chaotic.

The repaired alarm clock rang at six the next morning. Harry turned it off quickly and got dressed as quietly as possible. His plan was to sit in front of the door and wait for the post. This way, he'd be the first to get the letters and would be up in his bedroom before anybody knew anything about his plan.

Unfortunately, things didn't go his way.

In front of the door, Harry was preoccupied with watching the stairs behind him to make sure that nobody had heard him. He yelled with fright as he stepped on something big and squashy in front of him. A quick dash to the lights revealed that he'd stepped on his uncle's face. _He stayed here all night?_ What could possibly be in the letter that would make Uncle Vernon sleep in front of a door?

The mail arrived, landing right on Uncle Vernon's stomach. All that there was today was a large pile of a dozen or so letters addressed in green ink.

"Give-" His demand was cut off by Uncle Vernon tearing the letters.

Melanie chose to come down the stairs at that moment, having been woken up first by the alarm clock, which she ignored to the best of her abilities, and then Harry's shouting. The situation would've been funny to anybody else. Now, it was a declaration of war over the letters.

"Just leave it. Obviously, whoever it is that keeps sending these letters is getting more desperate for us to get them," Melanie said to Harry, who just nodded absentmindedly with no intentions of doing that.

The situation was getting worse and worse. That day, Uncle Vernon had boarded up the mail slot, but the letters were pushed under the door the next. There were no less than twenty letters that time.

Uncle Vernon stayed home again. After shredding, soaking and then burning the letters, he ran around the house boarding up all the cracks. However, the next day, twenty-four letters, twelve for Harry and twelve for Melanie, were hidden inside two dozen eggs that the milkman handed Aunt Petunia through the living room window which had temporarily been un-boarded for the milkman.

"Lunatics, all of 'em," Vernon declared with a slightly frantic look on his face.

On Sunday morning, which was the next day, Uncle Vernon sat down at the breakfast table. He was worn out from his efforts to stop the letters but was rather happy that day.

"No post on Sundays." His statement was proven false as letters began spewing out of the kitchen chimney. Harry leapt into the air, trying to catch a letter while Melanie held her arms in front of her face, not wanting to get paper cuts on her face.

"Out! OUT!"

Melanie and Harry were kicked out of the kitchen. Not a minute later, the other three inhabitants of the house ran out of the room.

"That does it. I want you all back here in five minutes ready to leave. We're going away. Just pack some clothes. No arguments!" Uncle Vernon's voice was stressed.

They drove. Nobody asked where. Every once in a while, Uncle Vernon would take a sharp turn to "shake 'em off," as he put it.

They didn't stop all day and this continued for the next four days. Each morning, they would have to leave a hotel when they were asked about a hundred or so letters dropped outside their door.

Finally, Uncle Vernon had enough. He came back with a long, thin package and declared that he'd found the perfect place for them. Perched on top of a large rock way out at sea was a little shack. It was absolutely freezing there, but Melanie managed to get a fire going. Miraculously, none of them got sick.

Overall, this was the worst birthday that Harry and Melanie could ever imagine. They talked late into the night, trying to figure out more about the letters when the entire hut shook. Somebody had knocked the door.

**{A/N: This chapter might've been a little boring as we all kinda know what was going to happen. The next one is going to be them getting picked up and brought to Diagon Alley. I hope you enjoyed this chapter regardless of the lack of new events. Read and review. :D}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	3. Hagrid and Diagon Alley

**{A/N: Third chapter. :D Thanks to everybody who's reading!**

**Disclaimer: Me? I'm not J.K. Rowling. I don't own the Harry Potter series, sadly.}**

Another knock.

"Who's there?" Uncle Vernon shouted, holding a rifle. _So that's the package he was holding yesterday,_Melanie realized. "I warn you; I'm armed!"

There a pause, but when the visitor outside seemed to realize that Uncle Vernon wasn't going to open the door, it was knocked down with a smash.

A giant man was standing in the doorway, looking rather frightening. His face was nearly hidden by long, shaggy hair and a tangled beard, both of which were soaking wet and dripping water into their little hut. His eyes were just visible, glinting like small, black stones.

The giant squeezed through the doorway and picked up the door. He put it back into the frame, though the hinges were now on the wrong side, and asked in a friendly manner, "Couldn't make us a cup o' tea, could yeh? It's not been an easy journey…"

"An' here's Harry and Melanie! Las' time I saw you two, you was only a baby. You two seem ter be takin' after yer mum and dad." Indeed, it was quite strange. Harry was a copy of his dad while Melanie was a copy of her mom, but each had the other parent's eyes.

Melanie watched, highly amused, how the giant terrified Dudley and twisted the rifle as if it were simply a piece of yarn. He seemed unaware of the fact that he was quite intimidating. The giant handed over a cake for the two of them and introduced himself as Rubeus Hagrid.

Hagrid eyed their fire and nodded. He bent over the fireplace and a few seconds later, the fire grew to a roaring size that even Melanie couldn't have made in this weather. She always had a talent with fires, whether it was starting them or keeping them going, which was why she cooked.

The giant went through his pockets and took out various items, but Melanie was interested in the sausages.

_Food._

While she ate, the giant talked to Harry. Melanie stayed quiet, just paying attention to what they were saying. When he mentioned Hogwarts, she could finally visualize the word on the letter. She tried to think about what the letter could say and could barely visualize an old piece of parchment in the envelope.

Her thinking was stopped when Hagrid suddenly shouted, "ALL WHAT?" The Dursleys cowered against the wall as Hagrid yelled at them.

Melanie only caught one sentence: "Harry, Melanie – yer're wizards. Well, witch, wizard, same meanin' "

When Harry was finished reading his letter, she reached over to take it. Sure enough, the letter confirmed what Hagrid had been saying.

_A witch? How is this possible? Magic just doesn't exist. But, I suppose it does. _This last part was thought as she watched Hagrid pull an owl (_A REAL OWL?_) from his pocket, give it a piece of parchment and toss it out the window.

Something about how their parents didn't die in a car crash and something about a murderer called Voldemort. Somebody named Dumbledore, and Dudley turned into a pig. _Wait a minute, wait – a – minute._She turned her head to look at Dudley. _A pig tail!_ She was torn between fright and amusement. Dudley had sure gotten what was coming, but if Hagrid could do that, what else would magic be able to do? Seeing just how terrified the boy was, however, Melanie felt a pang of sympathy for him.

"Shouldn'ta lost me temper," Hagrid said, "but it didn't work anyway. Meant ter turn him into a pig, but I suppose he was so much like a pig anyway there wasn't much left ter do."

He gave them a look and Melanie promised that they wouldn't tell anybody, though she wasn't entirely sure how they could be able to get rid of that tail if somebody magical wasn't told about it. Hagrid smiled, throwing his coat over the two siblings and told them to ignore the dormice in the pockets.

~.~.~.~.~

Harry woke up early the next morning. Even though he could tell that it was probably time to wake up, he kept his eyes shut, not wanting to lose the last bits of the dream he had last night. A giant telling them that they were magic; how ridiculous!

His thinking was interrupted as Hagrid's jacket was yanked off him by Melanie sitting up. _So it wasn't a dream._

Of course, that got Harry sitting up and gazing at the still sleeping Hagrid, feeling ecstatic. "This means that we don't have to stay with the Dursleys anymore." A screech was followed by an angry and soaked owl dropping a newspaper on Hagrid. The owl swooped down and started attacking Hagrid's coat.

"Don't do that," Harry scolded the owl. He tried to wave the owl away, but it snapped its beak near his finger and continued destroying the coat.

"Hagrid! There's an owl-"

"Pay him," Hagrid interrupted.

"What? Are you sure you're still not sleeping?" Melanie questioned.

"Look in the pockets."

After pulling a pile of stuff, that certainly shouldn't have been able to all fit in that coat, Harry pulled out a handful of odd coins.

"Give him five Knuts," Hagrid instructed, still half-asleep.

"You do realize that these are coins and not snacks," Melanie said.

Hagrid laughed, finally awake. He reached over and plucked five small, bronze coins to put in the pouch that was tied to the owl's leg. Finally, the owl left while Melanie shot it a glare.

"Best be off, lots ter do today, gotta get up ter London an' buy all yer stuff fer school."

Melanie and Harry shared a look; they didn't have money. "Hagrid? We haven't got any money."

After a reassurance that they did indeed have money ("A bank run by goblins? Really?"), they were off in a small boat back to land.

The boat, charmed by Hagrid, moved faster than normal and didn't seem to need somebody to steer it. During the time it took for them to get to shore, they learned that there was a Ministry of Magic ("Well, it's quite a useless government if it doesn't do anything right, huh, Harry?").

There were a few moments of panic when they were on the Muggle train, with Hagrid doing and saying things so obviously strange. Eventually, though, they did get off the Muggle transportation.

"This is it," said Hagrid. "The Leaky Cauldron. It's a famous place."

"Seems famous," Melanie said sarcastically. The place was a tiny, grubby-looking pub. If it hadn't been pointed out, they probably wouldn't have even noticed it. _Probably not famous, at least not in the Muggle world._

Inside the pub, everybody seemed to know Hagrid. They all waved and smiled and the bartender even reached for a glass, asking Hagrid what he wanted.

"Can't, Tom, I'm on Hogwarts business." At that moment, Hagrid decided to draw attention to Harry, who was immediately mobbed by crowds of wizards and witches, all wanting to shake hands with him. Melanie smirked and stepped to the side, leaving Harry to deal with the crowd of admirers alone.

"Thanks so much, Melanie. Your support with fending off the crowd was _so_helpful." Despite his words, Harry didn't seem to be actually annoyed. It was nice, after all, to go from being treated like some unwanted insect to a celebrity.

Diagon Alley was amazing. Trying not to give herself whiplash, Melanie was turning her head in all directions and listening to the snippets of conversation, not quite able to believe everything she was hearing.

Looking at the various stores and her list of school supplies, she thought tiredly, _This is going to take a while._

The rest of the morning was spent roaming around Diagon Alley, getting stuff for school. Hagrid bought them each a birthday present: Hedwig, a snowy owl, for Harry and Ash, a black kitten, for Melanie. The wands they got were Holly with Phoenix feather and Crypress with Unicorn hair, for Harry and Melanie respectively. The only other Hogwarts student that they met didn't exactly give them optimistic views about the rest of the school.

The boy, who Melanie somehow recognized as Draco Malfoy _(How in the world do I know this?)_, reminded her of Dudley: rude, inconsiderate, and arrogant. Within the few minutes that they'd been in the same room, he'd managed to: insult about ¾ of the school, confuse the two siblings by assuming that they knew what he was talking about, making them feel rather ignorant by assuming they knew what he was talking about, and bring up their dead parents. Of course, his statements about Slytherin being the best House were doubtful considering that he had never been to Hogwarts before.

Thankfully, Madam Malkin, the owner of the store, had handed Melanie and Harry their robes before they'd snapped at Draco for being so nonchalant about their parents.

For the remainder of the summer, living with the Dursleys had certainly improved. They all seemed too scared of the possibility of Hagrid coming back to bother Harry or Melanie. It would've been lonely if they didn't have each other as the other three would ignore them. Uncle Vernon had even agreed to bring them to King's Cross Station without protesting.

However, the moment Uncle Vernon abandoned them at the station, Harry knew why he was so nice before.

There was no platform 9¾.

"What're we going to do? We're going to be late," Melanie moaned, starting to panic. This prompted Harry to ask a guard about the train leaving at eleven o'clock ("There is no train leaving at that time. Stop wasting my time!"). The two were on the verge of tapping bricks at the wall with their wands in between platforms nine and ten when they heard a voice behind them.

"-packed with Muggles, of course-"

"Muggles? Does that mean-" Melanie didn't finish her question as she had to sprint to catch up to Harry, who was heading towards the woman who had made the comment about Muggles.

"He's running at a wall," Harry muttered. He was about to call out a warning, something along the lines of 'THERE'S A WALL IN FRONT OF YOU', when the red-haired boy running had disappeared entirely.

Two more boys, probably twins, ran and disappeared. At this point, Harry was getting desperate.

"Excuse me," he said to the woman, who seemed to understand what was going on and told them about the platform.

"Let me get this straight. You," Melanie pointed at the woman, "want us," she pointed to the two of them, "to run at a wall," she finished, with a clap that was supposed to represent them crashing into a wall. The woman only chuckled with amusement and gave them a 'go-on' motion.

"Well, let's go run into a wall," said Harry.

Somehow, the expected crash never came. Instead, they were on platform 9¾.

The scarlet Hogwarts steam engine was waiting to go, the doors open as parents loaded their kids onto the train.

**{A/N: If this chapter was a little rushed at parts, I just wanted to skim over some of the stuff we already knew and get to the more 'important' events. If any of you notice a word that I use a lot, don't hesitate to tell me and suggest an alternative. Read and Review!}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	4. Hogwarts Express

**{A/N: Okay, chapter four. Disclaimer: Still not J.K. Rowling.}**

"Damn it, Harry!" Melanie yelled, rubbing her sore foot. This was the second time that Harry's trunk had been dropped onto her foot. "Why doesn't this stupid thing ever land on your foot?"

Harry only shrugged. "It can't be that heavy. Let's try again." It was a truly laughable sight; two scrawny eleven year olds, trying to heave a trunk onto a train.

"It can't be that heavy," Melanie mocked. "What do you have in there? Rocks?"

"No; just Hagrid."

"Want a hand?" said one of the red-haired twins that Harry had seen run 'into' the wall.

"Yes, before this idiot drops the trunk onto my foot. _Again."_

"Oy, Fred! C'mere and help!"

The three boys managed to get the trunk into a corner of the compartment with, thankfully, no more incidents.

"Thanks," said Harry, making the mistake of brushing his hair out of his eyes.

"What's that?" said one of the twins, pointing at Harry's lightning scar. Melanie stared at it too; this was her first time seeing it but she remembered it from 'her' memories.

"Blimey," said the other twin. "Are you-?"

"He is! Aren't you?" The last part was directed to Harry.

"What?" Harry was so oblivious.

"Harry Potter," the twins said in synchronisation.

"Oh, him. I mean, yes, I am."

The two gawked at Harry, then turned to Melanie with a look of confusion. Suddenly, their faces went blank before seeming to realize something. "And you must be-"

"Fred? George? Are you there?" interrupted a voice. The two boys finally stopped staring at Harry and Melanie, to his relief.

"Well then," said Melanie. She bowed low and mocked, "Mr. H. Potter, would you give me the ultimate pleasure and allow me to be seated near you in your compartment?"

"Oh, shut up." Harry sat down next to the window where he could watch the red-haired family and listen to what they were saying.

He watched, amused, as the mother tried to scrub a handkerchief across the youngest boys nose. He felt a pang of jealousy as he watched the family interact like a family should. That, however, was erased by embarrassment as his name was brought up in conversation. The family split up, all the boys going onto the train and the youngest child, a girl, staying with her mother on the platform.

The door of the compartment slid open, and the youngest redheaded boy came in.

"Anyone sitting there?" He pointed at the seat opposite Harry. "Everywhere else is full."

Harry gestured at the seat and the boy sat down, obviously wanting to ask Harry about his scar or something with the way he was staring at his forehead.

"I doubt the magical train is full," Melanie whispered in Harry's ear.

The door opened again and the twins were back.

"Hey, Ron. Listen, we're going down the middle of the train – Lee Jordan's got a giant tarantula down there."

"Right," mumbled Ron.

"Harry," said the other twin, "did we introduce ourselves? Fred and George Weasley. And this is Ron, our brother. See you later then."

Once the twins were gone, Ron asked, "Are you really Harry Potter?" At that point, Melanie stopped listening. She could tell she was going to have to get used to people badgering Harry and ignoring her. She didn't mind much, but it was slightly annoying that she didn't have anybody to talk to now. At least it gave her time to think.

The only time she talked throughout the entire conversation was when Ron was talking about his family.

"I'm Melanie Potter, Harry's twin, er, sister, I suppose." Ron seemed rather embarrassed at not really knowing who she was and settled for mumbling a quick, "Hi."

She was nibbling on a pumpkin pastry when the compartment door opened again. She expected to see one of the twins or perhaps the rumoured tarantula, but not a girl with bushy brown hair.

"Has anyone seen a toad? Neville's lost one."

"We've already told him we haven't seen it," said Ron, but the girl wasn't listening.

"Oh, are you doing magic? Let's see it then." Only then did Melanie realize that he had his wand out. The girl sat done next to Ron.

"Er, all right. Sunshine, daisies, butter mellow; turn this stupid, fat rat yellow." Nothing happened.

Melanie burst out laughing. "I'm sorry, but that sounds like a Muggle spell." At this, the other girl started laughing as well, causing Ron to blush.

"Are you sure that's a real spell? I've tried a few simple spells just for practice and it's all worked for me. Nobody in my family's magic at all, it was ever such a surprise when I got my letter, but I was ever so pleased, of course, I mean, it's the very best school of witchcraft there is, I've heard – I've learned all our course books by heart, of course, I just hope it will be enough – I'm Hermione Granger, by the way, who are you?" Hermione seemed to have mastered the art of fast speech.

The other three shared looks; none of them having learned the course books by heart.

"I'm Ron Weasley."

"Harry Potter."

This, of course, had Hermione going into a list of books that Harry was mention in, then just talking in general about the houses before dismissing herself to go look for the missing toad.

Melanie shrugged. "I suppose I'm not in any of those books she mentioned."

_Again? _The compartment door opened for the fourth time since Harry and Melanie had been in that compartment.

Three boys entered this time, and Melanie recognized the middle one with the blond hair. She shot a glare at him before looking at Harry, who also seemed to recognize him.

"Is it true?" said the blond boy. "They're saying all down the train that Harry Potter's in this compartment. So it's you, is it?"

"Yes."

"Oh, this is Crabbe and this is Goyle," the boy said, waving off the introductions. Clearly, they were something along the lines of bodyguards instead of friends. "And my name's Malfoy, Draco Malfoy."

Ron coughed to hide a snigger.

"Think my name's funny, do you? No need to ask who you are. My father told me all the Weasleys have red hair, freckles, and more children than they can afford. Are you a Weasley too?" The last part was directed at Melanie, obviously judging by her red hair and not noticing that everything of hers was brand new.

"I'm Melanie Potter, and you're that idiotic first year we saw shopping for robes." Normally, she wouldn't have been quite so rude, but Ron's embarrassment made her angry at Draco, who just sniffed and turned back to Harry.

"You'll soon find out some wizarding families are much better than others, Potter. You don't want to go making friends with the wrong sort. I can help you there." He held out his hand, but Harry didn't take it.

"I think I can tell who the wrong sort are for myself, thanks," Harry said coolly.

"Besides, if he were to shake your hand, wouldn't he already be making friends with the wrong kind?" Melanie's question was asked in the most naive voice she could conjure up at the moment.

Draco's face started to turn red. Before he could say anything, Melanie spoke again.

"We don't need to be friends with brats like you. I've had enough of bullies for a lifetime; now why don't you go off like a good little boy."

Draco sniffed haughtily and exited the compartment, leaving with his dignity. Before he left, however, he had some harsh parting words.

"You hang around with riffraff like the Weasleys and that Hagrid, and it'll rub off on you. Unless you're a bit politer you'll go the same way as your parents." The compartment door slammed shut, leaving behind a tense, angry silence.

"That little-" Harry began.

"If you shook his hand, Harry, I would've had to push you out the train window." At least her brother was a good judge of character.

"I've heard of his family," said Ron angrily. "They were some of the first to come back to our side after You-Know-Who disappeared. Said they'd been bewitched. My dad doesn't believe it. He says Malfoy's father didn't need an excuse to go over to the Dark Side." Hermione came through the door again. "Can we help you with something?" Ron snapped.

"You'd better hurry up and put your robes on, I've just been up to the front to ask the conductor, and he says we're nearly there. You haven't been fighting, have you? You'll be in trouble before we even get there!"

"Would you mind leaving while we change?" said Ron, ignoring the question.

"All right – I only came in here because people outside are behaving very childishly, racing up and down the corridors. And you've got dirt on your nose, by the way, did you know?"

"Harry, I should go get changed somewhere. Hermione, would you mind if I came with you?" Hermione nodded and Melanie followed her further down the train to an empty compartment. _Everywhere else is full. Yeah, right._

The changed quickly and sat there in silence. "We should join the boys; I left my stuff there."

"Oh, all right," Hermione said, not sounding too happy about having to go back to where Ron was.

Before long, the train had stopped and they exited the train ("Mel, you leave your stuff on the train!" "How was I supposed to know that?").

Hagrid called all the first years over to him and got them into boats of four. There was an awkward silence as they realized that there were five people (Ron, Harry, Melanie, Neville, Hermione) but Melanie left to go to another boat with some girls. She didn't want to have to split up with Harry, but she wasn't sure that shy little Neville or talkative Hermione would be well accepted anywhere else. As well, she could tell that Ron really didn't want to go sit with his brothers.

The other three girls in her boat were Lavender, Patil, Pavarti. For a second, she hoped that they could be her friends, but they seemed to already be friends with each other. They ignored her and she ignored them as they giggled and chatted, instead choosing to watch the castle.

It was simply beautiful; the water was calm and reflected a perfect image of the castle and the boats. Everybody was silent, even the girls that were in the same boat as Melanie, and watched as they approached the castle. They followed Hagrid up a passageway and came out onto the smooth, damp grass right in front of the castle.

"Every here? You there, still got yer toad?" _Hagrid found Neville's toad?_

Hagrid raised a gigantic fist and knocked three times on the castle door.

**{A/N: That's another chapter done. :D Probably not my best chapter, but it was kind of a filler chapter that describes their journey. Updates are probably going to slow down now as school's coming around again. *Sigh* Read and review!}**

**~ScalleneGalleon~**


	5. Sorted

**{A/N: Chapter Five. This chapter was probably kinda short, but I'll update this weekend.**

**Disclaimer: I haven't turned into J.K. Rowling in between now and the time that I last posted. Just for the record.}**

The door swung open at once. A tall, black-haired witch in emerald-green robes stood in the doorway.

"The firs' years, Professor McGonagall," said Hagrid.

"Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here."

The doors opened wider to let the many first years in. Melanie listened as Professor McGonagall introduced them to Hogwarts and told them about the four houses. She felt a twinge of nervousness as it was declared that the Sorting Ceremony would take place in a few minutes.

"Harry?" Melanie said, as loudly as she dared. After the crowd in the Leaky Cauldron, she didn't particularly feel like calling his name loud enough to start a riot at Hogwarts.

"Mel!" She headed towards Harry and saw the group of four. "Who were you in a boat with?"

"…I'm not entirely sure."

After shooting a grin at his sister, Harry turned to Ron. "How exactly do they sort us into houses?"

"Some sort of test, I think. Fred said it hurts a lot, but I think he was joking."

At Harry's slightly nervous face, Melanie snorted and said, "The same Fred that gave you the bogus rat spell?"

Ron's response was drowned out by the screams as ghosts began to drift through the wall. They talked a little before noticing any of the first years (which was odd; how could they miss so many students just standing there), but then were sent away by Professor McGonagall.

"Now, form a line, and follow me." The first years followed Professor McGonagall as she led them into the Great Hall. The whole place was lit by thousand and thousand of floating candles. The five tables were laid with glittering gold plates and goblets. One table was for the teachers while the other four were, presumably, for the four Houses. The roof looked like the sky outside ("It's bewitched to look like the sky outside. I read about it in Hogwarts, a History").

Melanie felt a sense of déjà vu, but that couldn't be possible. Of course, she didn't think that magic was possible until this summer. There'd always been strange things happening, but she'd mostly blamed those on freak occurrences. This particular instance had a strange feeling.

Instead of the simple 'I feel like I've done/seen/heard/experienced this before,' it was a feeling that it was the same, but everything was wrong. She dismissed it as her being nervous.

All the first year's drifting eyes were drawn back to the middle of the room as Professor McGonagall placed a four-legged stool in front of the first years and then a wizard's hat on top of the stool.

Somebody whispered, "What're we supposed to do?" before the hat started to sing.

_"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty,___

But don't judge on what you see,

I'll eat myself if you can find

A smarter hat than me.

You can keep your bowlers black,

Your top hats sleek and tall,

For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat

And I can cap them all.

There's nothing hidden in your head

The Sorting Hat can't see,

So try me on and I will tell you

Where you ought to be.

You might belong in Gryffindor,

Where dwell the brave at heart,

Their daring, nerve, and chivalry

Set Gryffindors apart;

You might belong in Hufflepuff,

Where they are just and loyal,

Those patient Hufflepuffs are true

And unafraid of toil;

Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw, if you've a ready mind,

Where those of wit and learning,

Will always find their kind;

Or perhaps in Slytherin

You'll make your real friends,

Those cunning folk use any means

To achieve their ends.

So put me on! Don't be afraid!

And don't get in a flap!

You're in safe hands (though I have none)

For I'm a Thinking Cap!"

Applause followed the song, leaving Melanie feeling rather confused. _Why is there a hat?_ Suddenly it clicked as she thought about the lyrics, feeling the urge to face palm at herself.

"When I call your name, you will put on the hat and sit on the stool to be sorted." With that, Professor McGonagall began reading from a long roll of parchment.

Hermione and Neville were both sorted into Gryffindor while Draco, to his wishes, was sorted into Slytherin with Crabbe and Goyle.

"Potter, Harry!"

As Harry walked up to the hat, whispers were heard all around the room wondering whether or not it was actually '_The Harry Potter_.'

His Sorting took a while longer before the hat finally cried out, "Gryffindor."

"Thomas, Dean!" _Wait what?_ Unless Melanie had her alphabet seriously confused, she was pretty sure that Melanie would come after Harry and Potter before Thomas. However, before the boy called even got halfway up to the stool, everything suddenly – shifted.

"Potter, Melanie!" She looked around in confusion, noticing that 'Thomas, Dean' was still with the group of first years.

"Another Potter?" "I didn't know he had a sister?" "Is it actually _A Potter_ or just a Potter?"

As the speculations circled around the Great Hall, Melanie couldn't help but feel a little hurt that Harry was so widely known while she was, practically, nobody.

The hat was dropped over her head, sliding down onto to stop at her nose.

_"Oh my, what is this?"_ The Sorting Hat seemed to be torn between confusion and amusement_. "My, my, my. This is quite a conundrum. You'd be suited quite well for Hufflepuff, but that's not what's supposed to happen, is it? At least, not yet."_

_What do you mean? _Melanie thought to the hat, which only chuckled.

_"Can't tell you that, but I can do something to help you."_ The Sorting Hat went through her memories, and seemed toshift them, which was highly uncomfortable for her.

_"Can't tell you what I did, but you'll figure out soon. Keep an eye on your brother; things will get quite difficult in - _GRYFFINDOR!_"_

The last word was shouted out so loudly that Melanie started and nearly fell off the stool. Quickly, she put the hat back onto the stool and nearly ran to the Gryffindor table. Once she was there, she sat down next to Harry and rubbed her temples.

"Headache?" Harry whispered. Melanie nodded miserably, cringing as another round of cheering broke out around her as Dean Thomas was sorted into Gryffindor.

She put her head on the table, pushing some plates out of the way. She had no appetite left; she only wanted to go to their dorms and get some rest.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, they were dismissed. Melanie opened her eyes then winced at the bright light. She didn't remember walking up any stairs or going through a door into the Gryffindor Common Room. She didn't remember Hermione's hand on her shoulder, leading her up to a room.

"G'night," Melanie muttered, though not sure who she was talking to, before falling asleep.

That night, she dreamed of Hogwarts.

It started off with her walking into some castle that seemed vaguely similar to Hogwarts, but significantly changed. Although the ceiling of the Great Hall was still sky-patterned, the walls also had paintings on them, some of which reminded her of Muggle graffiti.

At the four tables, faces were blurry but the colours of their ties were bright and bold. What struck Melanie as the oddest was how the four Houses were mingling rather than staying separate. It had seemed that there was House rivalry that just couldn't be fixed.

Spells were being cast all around, but none seemed to be aimed at anybody in particular. The teachers, at the fifth table, instead of scolding the students casting spells, just ignored it, occasionally casting a shield from the spells when one came too close for comfort.

This was what felt right to Melanie.

**{A/N: Sorry it took a while. D: I originally planned to update yesterday, but then I realized we had a big project due ;-; Also, when I finished the project, my internet decided to just be like: NOPE! IMMA SHUT DOWN NOW. So… yeah… Reviews make my day. :D *badly concealed plea for reviewers.*}**

**~ScalleneGalleons~**


	6. Halloween

**{A/N: Chapter Six: I'm probably going to end up skipping over a lot of the classes and just summarizing most of what happens there. This is also the longest chapter yet, I think.**

**Disclaimer: Still not J.K. Rowling.}**

Hogwarts was really testing Melanie's patience.

Spells were extremely difficult for her to cast. Even a simple little charm took her just as long as Neville Longbottom to learn. The two of them seemed to be tying for last. Of course, it didn't help that Hermione was always there, doing everything perfectly. Despite Hermione's best attempts to help Melanie, she was just rubbish at spells.

Thankfully, it seemed to be a different story for Potions, which was quickly becoming her favourite yet least favourite subject.

Melanie excelled at Potions, doing them as well as Hermione could. Even Professor Snape couldn't find much to criticize when Melanie's potions were looked at. However, the same couldn't be said for everybody else in the class.

Snape teased them all mercilessly, except for the Slytherins. However, the professor seemed to particularly hate Harry, whose father's supposed arrogance was brought up constantly, Ron, by association of Harry, and Neville, who was constantly reduced to a nervous wreck in those classes. Even if the Slytherin's had some sludge in a cauldron instead of whatever potion they were supposed to make, it didn't seem like Snape even noticed that.

One time, when Draco was being particularly obnoxious, Melanie lost her temper and pointed her wand at Draco, temporarily forgetting that the only few spells she knew couldn't do anything to him. A moment later, Draco's cauldron melted and the contents inside spilled everywhere. Although the potion wasn't explosive or acidic, it ended up drying and was hard to get off the floor and table. "Potions is a dangerous art, and I will tolerate no horsing around in my classroom" "But, Professor! I didn't do anything!"

Before long, Melanie decided to put all her efforts into Potions, if only because she couldn't do anything else. Transfiguration and Charms had spells, which she could never perform properly. Defence against Dark Arts was supposed to have spells, but was a joke with Professor Quirrel as a teacher. Herbology didn't work at all as all the plants seemed to shy away from her.

_'Cooking' and essays. Great. That's all I'm good at here at a magical school._

Even Hogwarts itself seemed against her. Stairs would move constantly and the portraits seemed to take pleasure in leading her the wrong way. Seeing Peeves had become a daily occurrence.

She'd also found out that the Sorting Hat hadn't moved her memories. No, she'd gotten a second set of memories, causing headaches whenever she remembered anything. What confused her was that she wasn't in those memories at all. She didn't seem to see things from somebody else's perspective. Instead, she was a free-floating viewer, but bound to follow Harry.

What made this bearable was Hermione, who tutored Melanie with the spells as much as she could. In return, Melanie yelled at everybody who made fun of Hermione for being a know-it-all.

All in all, Hogwarts wasn't what she expected.

~.~.~.~.~

"YOU DID WHAT?" Melanie had just heard the news of Harry's midnight 'duel' with Draco Malfoy. Without him telling her what happened, she had a visual picture of it. _That coward didn't even come! But what was with that dog?_

"I told you," said Harry stubbornly, not meeting Melanie's eyes.

"You-" A package dropped onto the table in front of them shaped, quite obviously, like a broomstick.

"Quidditch?" Harry nodded.

"A Nimbus Two Thousand! I've never even touched one," whispered Ron enviously.

Draco came over and seized the broomstick, package and all.

"That's a broomstick. You'll be in for it this time, Potter, first years aren't allowed them."

"It's not any old broomstick," Ron bragged, "it's a Nimbus Two Thousand. What did you say you've got at home, Malfoy, a Comet Two Sixty? Comets look flashy, but they're not in the same league as the Nimbus."

"What would you know about it, Weasley, you couldn't afford half the handle."

"Draco, would you kindly go back to your table before I make you go back there." Melanie's pent up frustrations about what a let-down Hogwarts was made her sound angrier than she actually was, and Draco wisely retreated.

"I'm going to go to Hermione," said Melanie, feeling ignored as the two boys started talking about Quidditch.

Hermione was furious. "I suppose he thinks that that's his reward for breaking the rules?"

"My brother isn't like that," Melanie snapped. The two fell into an awkward silence which was quickly broken by apologies from both of them.

"Let's just get to class." They walked off, arm in arm, as they discussed what they might be learning that day.

~.~.~.~.~

The days passed in odd lurches for Melanie and her mood got worse and worse. One day, a week before Halloween, she sat out in the Gryffindor Common Room in front of the fireplace. Suddenly, when she closed her eyes to blink, they stayed closed. Images flashed through her mind, like memories, but she wasn't in any of them.

Harry receiving something silvery for Christmas; Hadgrid acquiring a dragon and telling the other three about it; Harry's first Quidditch game where his broom was cursed; Getting caught out in the hall and losing many points; Opening the door on the forbidden third floor.

Infuriatingly, that was where the images stopped. Although her mind was pouding from such a large memory intake, she wanted to know more.

Although it had only taken an elongated blink, Melanie felt like she'd lived through all of them. It felt quite strange, as if her head was literally filled up with knowledge. Only, in this case, knowledge felt like pools of water that would escape her grasp.

Melanie blinked again, but only one 'image' came.

_She was sitting in front of the fireplace, in the time frame that she recognized as now. The fire roared higher and higher as she stared at it. She reached her hand forward… into the fire. There wasn't a scream, as somebody would expect from sticking your fire in the hand._

Melanie opened her eyes; indeed, the fire seemed to be getting bigger. Seized by a sudden recklessness, she touched the flames. Not receiving the expected burn, she stuck her whole hand in the fire before sitting in the fireplace itself. She hadn't used any spell, not that she could've cast it if she knew it anyways.

"Playing with fire is dangerous," Melanie scolded herself with a smirk as she gathered up a handful of flames, scaring her cat, Ash, away.

~.~.~.~.~

Halloween morning, everybody was greeted by the delicious smell of baking pumpkins.

"I've never had pumpkin pie before," Melanie said, mostly to herself, taking a slice.

"Really? I thought you lived with Muggles?" Hermione was about to go into a list of how many times that she had pumpkin pie before seeing the look in Melanie's eye. They'd talked about this before, and Melanie was there to help make sure that she didn't end up rambling too much.

"The Muggles I lived with were horrible. Let's just leave it at that."

During Charms, even Melanie felt eager to try the new spell. Professor Flitwick introduced the class to the spell by making various objects fly around the classroom, much to the amazement of the students, particularly the Muggleborns. Harry had been paired up with Melanie and Ron with Hermione.

_That isn't going to turn out well…_

"Now, don't forget that nice wrist movement we've been practicing!" squeaked Professor Flitwick. "Swish and flick, remember, swish and flick. And saying the magic words properly is very important too. Never forget Wizard Baruffio, who said 's' instead of 'f' and found himself on the floor with a buffalo on his chest." _Sure…_

It was very difficult. Harry and Melanie tried to perform the move, but the furthest they got was when Harry's feather flopped up and off the desk. Melanie's, on the other hand, remained stubbornly on the table and had to be pried off the surface ("Seems like you've accidentally cast a Sticking Charm, Miss Potter." "…What…").

Seamus, at the other table, prodded the feather with his wand out of impatience and set it on fire. Melanie waved her hand and the fire went out, causing confusion at that table. A small grin settled on her face, one of the first in a Charms class.

Ron, at the next table, wasn't having much more luck. Because of Hermione being able to do the spell and him not being able to, he was in a horrible mood at the end of class.

Melanie had a bad feeling about this.

"It's no wonder no one can stand her," Ron said to Harry as they made their way through the corridor. "She's a nightmare, honestly."

At that moment, Hermione bumped into Harry as she ran through the corridor in tears.

"I think she heard you," Harry pointed out, looking slightly uncomfortable.

"So?" said Ron, but he glanced in the direction that Hermione had run in. "She must've noticed she's got no friends."

**GO AFTER HER**_. _A voice sounded in Melanie's head. It seemed like it could be her conscience, but the voice was male and not hers. She didn't know any males that might be that voice, but it still soundly strangely familiar (she could only hope that her conscience wasn't Uncle Vernon).

Not needing much persuasion, she went to follow Hermione, but she had something to do first.

"Ron! Don't you dare say that. Haven't you two noticed how miserable she is every single time somebody calls her a name?" Melanie practically screamed. Thankfully, it was a crowded and, therefore, loud hallway.

Her words did make Ron seem slightly ashamed, although it still seemed like he stuck by the mantra that Hermione was a braggart, a know-it-all, and arrogant. Harry, on the other hand, look like he had half a mind to go tearing after her himself.

"Now, if you'll excuse me..."

Melanie hurried in the direction that Hermione had run off in. She had a feeling (a.k.a. she knew) that Hermione would probably be in the girl's bathroom or somewhere like that. Sure enough, Hermione was sitting against a wall, sobbing into her hands.

"Hermione?" Said girl stopped for a minute to look at Melanie. "Don't listen to Ron. He's an idiot."

Hermione smiled sadly, but resumed crying. Melanie sat down next to her, comforting her.

"He's right though," whispered Hermione. "I don't have many friends."

"That's just because they're all mean, picking on the smartest Gryffindor."

After a while, when Hermione stopped crying, they started talking normally and laughing. Time passed, and Melanie knew that they'd missed a class and probably the feast as well.

"Do you care that we missed a class?" Melanie asked Hermione, knowing the answer right away.

The brunette nodded fiercely. "I'm sorry for making you miss class."

"You know I don't care; after it, it wasn't Potions class. You know how rubbish-"

They were interrupted by a loud crash, followed by some low grunts and shuffling noises.

"What. Was. That," demanded Hermione. Melanie clamped her hand over the other girl's mouth, not wanting to attract attention to them.

_Too late_, she thought as the shuffling stopped for a moment before starting again, sounding louder as it headed towards them.

"What does that sound like? Damn it, Hermione. SNAP OUT OF IT!" By now, it was a lost cause to try to stay quiet. If this was what she thought it was, it was now a matter of trying to avoid being hit by whatever was coming.

"It… sounds like a troll." At those words, Melanie froze. Seeing that, Hermione started panicking.

_Hermione, cowering against a wall as the troll approaches. The door bolted shut and she screamed, which caused Harry and Ron to run into the room. Harry ran at the troll-_

At that, she cut the memory off. No point in waiting around.

Melanie stood up, testing her wand. Seeing how she couldn't even make a small rock on the ground levitate, she gave it to Hermione. "Hold that for me, would you? Before you say anything," and sure enough, Hermione was about to hand her the wand back, "you know how rubbish I am at spells. It'll only slow me down. I'll distract it, probably with some rubble; you go get a teacher."

"I can't leave you here!" Melanie glared, and the other girl nodded reluctantly.

The troll entered the bathroom, looking confused. When it spotted Hermione and Melanie, however, it seemed to have some idea of what to do. It grunted and lifted the club.

Melanie was banking on this working. This was the first time she had to try anything like this. She shut her eyes and concentrated. Sure enough, when she opened her eyes, there was a small fire in front of her. Some coaxing on her part and the fire blazed, making the troll pause momentarily. She reached her hand in, ignoring Hermione's warning, and took out… fire.

_It worked!_

"Hermione, when the troll charges, run."

"Why would it charge?"

"Because of this!" With the last word, she whipped her hand out, causing the fire to soar through the air and burn the troll's arm. Like she'd predicted, it grunted and ran, as best as it could, towards her. What didn't go according to plan was, when Hermione started running, the troll turned around and swung the club at her. Luckily, it didn't hit and that momentary distraction gave Melanie the chance to throw another fireball. Before long, the troll was covered in dozens of small burns, but was angrier than before.

The troll swung the club, missed Melanie, and shattered a mirror. "That's seven years of bad luck you know!" The club came out again, smashing another mirror and a sink. "Is that why you're so ugly? Did you smash a mirror at birth or something?" Her terrible taunt seemed to make it angry. The club came out again, and Melanie just barely moved out of the way.

She had to duck backwards, lose her balance and land in the pile of glass.

At that moment, the door to the bathroom opened. (_YAY I'M NOT GOING TO DIE TODAY) _Hermione stood in the doorway, saw Melanie on the ground and screamed.

"Harry! Ron! Help!" Hermione yelled. The two of them had been looking for her, just in case the troll had found her. Hermione had seen them in the hallway, yelled at them to follow her, then sprinted back to the bathroom. She took a step back and let the two boys into the bathroom. Melanie shifted her hands so nobody could see the glass embedded in her palm.

"What took you so long?" Melanie asked in irritation, getting up. The troll didn't even seem to notice that there were more people.

From there, the 'fight' played out as Melanie knew it would. The two boys took turns distracting the troll while she was in the position of Hermione. A few close encounters and one hover charm later, the troll was lying on the ground.

"Is it… dead?" Hermione questioned.

"I don't think so," said Harry, "I think it's just been knocked out." He bent down to wipe his wand on the troll's trousers, cleaning it of the troll's boogers.

"Mel, you okay?" She nodded shakily, hands still stinging. Harry noticed that and went over to give her a hug.

A sudden slamming and loud footsteps made the three of them look up. They hadn't realized how they they'd been, but somebody must've heard all the fighting. A moment later, Professor McGonagall burst into the room, closely followed by Snape and Quirrel, who took one look at the troll and fell over in a dead faint. Snape, sneering at the pathetic professor, walked over the troll.

Professor McGonagall was looking at the four students in the bathroom. Harry had never seen her look so angry or worried. His hopes of escaping without any problems faded quickly from his mind.

"What on earth were you thinking of? You're lucky you weren't killed. Why aren't you in the Gryffindor Common Room?" That last part was directed at the two boys. She'd seen them at the feast, which meant that they should've been escorted back to the Gryffindor tower by prefects.

Snape got out from the troll, announcing it to be unconscious. He glared at the two boys, obviously thinking that they were showing off.

Hermione spoke up: "Professor, they were looking for me." Around her, the other Gryffindors' jaws dropped, but which quickly closed as they tried to assume expressions of 'oh-that-I-knew-that.'

"Miss Granger!"

"I went looking for the troll because I – I thought that I could deal with it on my own – you know, because I've read all about that. I even dragged Melanie along. If they hadn't found me, I-I'd be dead now. The three of them distracted the troll. They didn't have time to come and fetch anybody else; it was about to finish me off when they arrived."

"Well – in that case…" Professor McGonagall clearly hadn't been expecting this turn of events. She regained her demeanour and continued. "Miss Granger, you foolish girl, how could you think of tackling a mountain troll on your own?"

Harry was speechless; Hermione was the last person to do anything against the rules, yet here she was, pretending that she had, to get them all out of trouble.

"Miss Granger, five points will be taken from Gryffindor for this. I'm very disappointed in you. If you're not hurt at all, you'd better get off to Gryffindor tower. Students are finishing the feast in their houses."

Hermione left, but not before casting a 'we're-talking-about-this-later' look at the other three.

"Well, I still say you were lucky, but not many first years could have taken on a full-grown mountain troll. You each win Gryffindor five points. Professor Dumbledore will be informed of this. You may go."

Before anybody did anything, Melanie said, "Professor, er…" Instead of going into a long explanation of what happened, she held out her hands. There were a few cuts, which seemed to be made worse by the thin lines of blood trickling down her palms.

"Miss Potter!" Professor McGonagall sounded astonished to see her injury. "Come with me."

"Mel, you said you were alright!" Harry accused, feeling worried. He'd thought that the blood was just from a scrape.

"It's nothing."

With that, Professor McGonagall lead her to the Hospital Wing while Harry and Ron went back to the Gryffindor tower.

"Professor? What's this?" A witch, presumably the school nurse, with brown hair and brown eyes hurried out of the door, having seen Professor McGonagall leading Melanie.

"Miss Potter." Melanie held out her hands for the mediwitch to examine.

"Oh dear," said the mediwitch, ushering her into the closest bed in the Hospital Wing.

After casting a quick spell that cleared away the mess, they found that there were more pieces of glass than expected. "This may hurt," warned Madam Pomfrey as she took out a bowl and something to remove the glass with.

_Plink. Plink. Plink._

Little glass shards were being dropped into the glass bowl, tinting the bowl red.

After all the glass was removed, a quick "Episkey" healed up the wound and some bandages were put on to prevent her from hurting the newly healed skin.

"What exactly happened?" Madam Pomfrey asked.

Melanie smirked, feeling tempted to say, 'Fought a mountain troll and fell onto a pile of glass.'

Instead, she just asked if she could return to her dorms, which was granted by a reluctant and curious mediwitch.

It seemed that the castle didn't want her to return to the Gryffindor area anytime soon. Even though she was certain that she walked along the path that she took every day to get from and to the Gryffindor tower, she soon ended up in the dungeons, near the Slytherin Common Room. She turned around to retrace her steps when somebody called out, "Who's there?"

Melanie froze, backing up quickly. Of course, the speaker caught up as they knew the dungeons better than she did. Who else would the person be but Draco Malfoy?

"What're you doing here?" Melanie spat.

"I'm here because this is where the Slytherins reside." Draco spoke as if to a very young child. "Why you're here would be a more appropriate question."

"I got lost." She glared, daring him to laugh or make some derisive comment about Gryffindors lacking brains.

"Are your hands bandaged?"

"Changing the subject?" When there was no answer to that question, she said, "Look, could you just tell me which way to go? Hogwarts seems to hate me at the moment."

Draco gave her short instructions, telling her to continue along the way and make a right. "After you. What?" Draco said in response to her glare. "Somebody has to make sure you don't get lost."

"Thanks, but no thanks." With that, Melanie sprinted down the corridor, the opposite way of which Draco had suggested. No way was she going to get further into Slytherin territory!

**{A/N: Draco being nice? It's the end of the world! Nah, he was just trying to trick her. Sorry if the sudden 'Melanie has fire magic' was too… sudden. XD I couldn't think of a way to introduce it better, and I kinda needed it for this chapter.}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	7. What Just Happened

**{A/N: Chapter Seven. Let's get on with the chapter, but I guess I should remind you all that I'm not J.K. Rowling.}**

As soon as the portrait of the Fat Lady swung open, Melanie was engulfed in a hug by Hermione, vision obscured by a mass of bushy brown hair. "Hermione… need to breathe."

"Oh, I'm so sorry! Are you alright?"

"Yes, I'm fine," said Melanie, effectively cutting off any rambling that Hermione was sure to have done. Just a little bit behind her stood Harry and Ron, who seemed to have made up with Hermione. At least, Ron wasn't glaring at Hermione anymore.

"Here." Harry handed her a sandwich, which, apparently, the Weasley twins had gotten from the kitchen.

They all stared at her while she ate, and she had an idea why. Of course, her idea was proven to be correct when Hermione said, "I told them what happened," and handed back her wand.

Before anybody else could add anything, Melanie said, "I'm tired, I'm grumpy and I want to sleep. I'll tell you three later." With that, she marched off to her dorm, lay down, and promptly fell asleep.

~.~.~.~.~

"Hermione?" Melanie whispered. Had the Gryffindor dorms changed overnight?

Everything was so much brighter, which she thought was due to the fact that red was replaced by yellow. Despite the change in scenery, at the foot of her bed was Ash, curled up and asleep. She looked over at the other beds and screamed. The other three beds were occupied by Susan Bones, Hannah Abbot, and another girl named Lydia Joans.

Her screamed awakened the other three girls, who immediately sat up.

"What're you doing here?" Hannah demanded, once she'd gotten slightly more than half awake.

"How did you get in the Hufflepuff dorms?" asked Susan.

"Aren't you a Gryffindor?" said the final girl, Lydia.

Before she could answer any of the questions, however, things Shifted, not unlike her Sorting. Instead of three curious Hufflepuffs glaring at the Gryffindor, their gazes went blank and then changed into something of concern and worry.

"Did you see a spider or something?" said Hannah, looking around the floors.

Melanie thought for a second, but decided to play along with the Hufflepuffs. "Er… No, just um, a nightmare." The other three nodded at her answer, then started to get ready for class.

Quickly getting ready (_A yellow and black tie!_), Melanie took a bag of what she would need ("Get out of the bag, Ash!) and ran out the room.

_The Hufflepuff Common Room is quite nice, _she commented to herself. _Are those blades of grass in the windows? How far down are we?_ She realized that she'd thought 'we' and not 'they'. Everything was patterned yellow and black, but then again, the Gryffindor area was all red and gold.

It was still quite early in the morning, so not many people were at the Great hall yet. Thankfully, Hermione was there, sporting a blue and bronze tie, looking quite panicked as she was trying to decide which table she was supposed to sit at. She spotted Melanie and went over to her.

"What is going on? I woke up in Ravenclaw this morning! If this is some prank, I swear-"

"I was just in the Hufflepuff dorms," interrupted Melanie, pointing at her black and yellow tie.

After a moment's pause, Hermione voiced the question that they were both thinking about. "Where are we supposed to sit? At Gryffindor or…?"

"Let's just stay at Gryffindor for now; we can always say that we were waiting for Harry-" At her brother's name, Melanie stopped talking. "Speaking of which, what houses do you think Ron and Harry are in?"

Hermione shrugged, leading the way to the Gryffindor table. The eyes of the few people in the Great Hall followed the two girls, clearly not used to seeing a Hufflepuff and a Ravenclaw walking together, let alone towards the Gryffindor table. Instead of sitting down, they hovered awkwardly around the end of the table that was nearer to the entrance of the Great Hall. Ignoring the staring students, the two girls just talked to pass the time until either Ron or Harry came in.

Ten minutes later, Ron burst into the Great Hall, looking slightly frantic. "Where the bloody hell were you two this morning?" whispered Ron. Then, he noticed their ties, becoming more and more confused. "Aren't you two in Gryffindor?" Melanie waited for the blank look to come over his face and him to realize that they weren't in Gryffindor, but it never happened.

The three talked over each other for the next minute or so, finally stopping when Ron gasped and pointed at the entrance. "Harry's with Malfoy!"

Sure enough, Harry and Draco were talking, being followed by Crabbe and Goyle. Melanie noticed that Harry's tie was silver and green. Although the two seemed to be arguing about something, neither seemed mad, only slightly irritated.

"Harry!" called Melanie. Her brother turned away from Draco, looking relieved when he saw that they weren't sporting Gryffindor ties like Ron.

"Thank goodness," Harry mumbled. "I thought I was the only one!"

"Okay, what happened?" Ron questioned, being the only one that didn't wake up in a new House.

"It seems that we've changed Houses." Hermione sounded extremely confused.

Melanie mused, "I could've sworn that I fell asleep in the Gryffindor dorms." She shared a look with Harry, being reminded of suddenly waking up at the Dursleys' house. He nodded, agreeing with both her words and her hidden meaning.

"Look, I know this is a strange question," said Harry, "but do you remember your Sorting?"

_Actually, I remember three: your Gryffindor Sorting, my Gryffindor Sorting, and, now, my Hufflepuff Sorting. _However, she lied and said she remembered two, as she expected everybody else did.

"I actually remember two Sortings also, but that's not possible!" exclaimed Hermione with a look on her face that clearly said that she wanted to search for something like this in the library. "What spell could be responsible for this?"

"Is there a problem?" The four talking started; they hadn't noticed that Professor McGonagall had come up to them. Again, the people in the Great Hall were all staring at them, having heard Hermione's raised voice and presuming that they were arguing.

"No, not at all, professor," assured Hermione. "We were just talking."

Professor McGonagall still looked doubtful but chose not to question what they were talking about. "Return to your House tables."

Back at the Slytherin table, Harry's mind was reeling. It felt odd being on friendly terms with Malfoy. _Draco,_ he corrected mentally. After all, he clearly remembered how he'd teased Ron on the train ride here, but that didn't seem to have happened in this 'universe'. Instead, Harry had embraced his 'Slytherin side' and made some vague statements that neither offended nor appeased either Ron or Draco. It was the same in Madam Malkin's shop. _It seems that I'm the one who's changed, not him._

_At least I can get Malf- Draco to be nicer now. Maybe he'll even stop calling people Mudbloods._ On a few occasions in his memories, he remembered lecturing Draco about how blood didn't matter, especially when he'd scoffed at Hermione.

The reason that Harry got into Slytherin this time, he assumed, was because he'd stayed still and listened to the Hat's ramblings instead of requesting to not be in Slytherin.

There were only a few things that Harry was mad about.

1: He wasn't friends with Ron or Hermione in this universe, although their friendship seemed to have carried over from the other universe. That was going to be odd explaining to everybody.

2: Melanie wasn't in the same house as him, so things would be extremely different now. Just when he'd gotten used to having a real family member…

3: He wasn't on the Quidditch team and the first match of the season was nearing. Which team was he supposed to root for anyways? He was in both of the Houses that were playing.

_At least Snape seems nicer in this universe._ The cranky professor seemed reluctant to criticize or take points away from his own House, which was a major bonus for Harry.

"Harry? Are you even listening to me?" With that sentence, Draco seemed more like the ruder version of himself, annoyed that he was being ignored.

"Huh? Sorry; just kinda tired today."

"Well, as I was saying…" Draco's voice faded into the background as Harry tuned him out, remembering to nod every once in a while. He cast a desperate look at Melanie, silently asking her to get him away from this blabbering Slytherin.

Melanie saw the look and ignored it. At least he had somebody to talk to! Sure, Susan, Hannah and Lydia were nice enough, but they were already friends. Although Melanie was 'friends' with them, she still felt awkward intruding into such a tight friendship.

She could see that Hermione was dealing with the same thing, having to choose between being friends with Cho Chang and Marietta Edgecomb, or Parvati and Padma Patil, another pair of twins.

_Is it more likely to have twins if you're magic or something?_

~.~.~.~.~

Through the next month, they remained in their separate Houses, talking and meeting up whenever possible. Everybody within Hogwarts was surprised at the beginning. After all, even if Hufflepuffs were seen talking to Gryffindors outside of class sometimes, it was extremely rare for Gryffindors and Slytherins to talk to each other without one hexing the other.

Eventually, the others Hogwarts students stopped hoping for a fight to break out between the four (a.k.a. stopped making bad excuses to lag behind and watch them interact in the hallways, classes and the Great Hall), while the professors stopped expecting a fight to break out between the four (a.k.a. stopped snooping around when the four of them would talk to each other).

Within the group of four, it was established that everybody had a second set of memories, one where they were all Gryffindors and the other where they were all in different Houses. However, what Melanie didn't tell any of them was that she had a third set of memories: a universe where she didn't exist.

**{A/N: And that's chapter 7! Finally getting off the canon events. XD I'm probably going to end up doing all 7 years (the last may or may not be horcrux hunting). [[EDIT: I'm not sure whether I'm doing six or seven years; we'll just have to see.]] Most of the main events are going to happen (e.g. Philosopher's stone first year, Chamber of Secrets second) but some will be different and the ones that are the same won't be narrated from Harry's POV. I'm wondering whether or not to do some Hermione and Ron POVs. Reviews make me happy. :D}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	8. Of Fire and Pop Quizzes

**{A/N: Chapter Eight. Virtual snacks and hugs for 'That Elusive Reader' and 'Lady Shagging Godiva' for their reviews! :D Thanks a bunch!**

**Btw, still not J.K. Rowling.}**

Harry was fuming; he'd missed the first Quidditch match! To top it all off, he had to root for the Slytherin team, who actually ended up winning due to the lack of a decent Seeker on the Gryffindor side. He didn't care that if he'd been a Gryffindor at this time he might've died, although it caused him to act particularly rude to Snape.

_Stupid alternate universe! _

At least, in this world, he'd managed to convince Draco to give back the Remembrall without the whole flying incident. But then again, this was the reason he wasn't on a Quidditch team.

After the match, they'd still gone to Hagrid's hut to have some tea and still managed to 'trick' Hagrid into revealing a 'Nicolas Flamel' as well as the fact that he called the giant, ferocious dog 'Fluffy' (_Fluffy… Actually… Fluffy…)_.

What he deemed worst of all, however, was how Pansy Parkinson had started talking to him and Draco. He could tell from the way that she acted that she was practically a female Dudley.

Harry hoped that he could be an influence of Pansy, and all of the Slytherin House for that matter.

Even though he'd gotten used to the green scenery, it was still unnerving waking up to a room decorated with green and silver rather than red and gold. It was even more unnerving how, sometimes, he would wake up to four angry pairs of Slytherin eyes, which would go blank and then 'recognize' him.

Something was definitely going on. Even the teachers would do that sometimes, though it was getting less and less often.

Most of his time, when not in lessons listening to a rambling Draco or out of lessons trying to find the Hermione, Melanie and Ron, was spent trying to search through his 'alternate memories'.

It was rather disorientating how he'd remember something from this universe and something from the other universe would run through the back of his mind at the same time.

Harry spent a week trying to get used to being a Slytherin. Thankfully, Hedwig didn't seem to care or notice that he was sitting at the Slytherin table in the mornings now. It was now her daily ritual to go and steal some of Harry's food.

He couldn't tell whether it was better being a Slytherin or Gryffindor. Snape didn't bother him while he was a Slytherin, choosing to ignore him altogether. However, the other three houses combined were almost as bad as Snape. Almost.

In the corridors, he'd constantly be followed by either stares from adoring 'Boy-Who-Lived' fans, or glares, hisses and hexes from those not caring that he was the 'Boy-Who-Lived'.

Being a Slytherin itself had challenges within the own House. The others normally treated him politely, but quite distantly. He was the Boy-Who-Lived, but being that in the Slytherin House could be dangerous. After all, he was the reason that some of their parents didn't have their promised glory and fame from Voldemort. Harry had a feeling that the reason that Draco was so nice to him at the beginning was something to do with his father.

However much he and, practically, the entire school wished it, he was not a Gryffindor this time around.

Melanie, on the other hand, was starting to feel right at home in the Hufflepuff House. She would never tell Harry, but it was easier without Harry around. People would talk to her instead of trying to get to know the 'Boy-Who-Lived' ("You're _his_ sister?").

As well, it helped that Hufflepuffs were nice and the other Houses were nice to Hufflepuffs, except for the Slytherins of course. Even if she was an outsider with Susan, Lydia and Hannah, she was still friends with them.

The only place that the four of them could really talk at was the library. Although most of their meals were spent sitting at the Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw table, they never got a chance to really talk then without others staring at them.

One day, about a month and a half after the House switch, the four went into the library. From Halloween up until that moment, Hermione had been questioning (pestering) Melanie about the 'fire powers', as she liked to call them. That day, Melanie was finally going to tell that what little she knew about it.

They'd been trying to find a spot to meet up. Talking at meals wouldn't do when they were surrounded by others. Outside, they could be overheard by people hiding behind trees or just passing by. The place that'd they'd finally agreed on was the library, after some enthusiastic recommendations from Hermione.

Melanie settled down at the table farthest from the entrance of the library. There, they were surrounded by shelves and had four chairs situated around a table. The four first years were always very careful to take out enough books from the shelves so that they could see anybody behind the shelves who might overhear them.

Usually, they'd meet up after the day's lessons and stay there until curfew.

"Melanie!" Hemione's greeting was punctuated by a _slam_ as she dropped all her books onto the table, making a very deep-in-thought Melanie jump.

"'Ello." The two girls waited in a silence that was only disturbed by the scratching of a quill as Hermione wrote furiously, trying to finish an essay from Charms.

At the front of the library, there was suddenly loud laughter, followed by a "SHHH!" from Madam Pince, a small thump as a floating feather duster whacked them on the heads, and, finally, quiet exclamations of surprise.

"She's really strict," remarked Ron, pulling a loose feather out of his hair. Once he and Harry got settled, they turned to stare at Melanie.

"Well, Mel? You said you wanted to tell us something?" prompted Harry.

"Er… Hermione, you told them about… Halloween, right?" A nod. "So, I guess you're wondering how it all happened?" Three nods this time. Unsure of what to say, Melanie just waved her hand over the table, and a small fire appeared.

Hermione jumped back, clutching her essay and books. "Get that away from the paper!"

"Don't worry; it's not hot enough to do much," reassured Melanie, who smiled with amusement as the two boys stared at it in awe.

"Did you just wave your hand and that happened?" questioned Ron, clearly wondering whether or not he should attempt testing how hot it was by sticking a finger into the fire.

Ron often joked about being the 'only true Gryffindor', which was usually followed up by one of the others calling him out on his 'true Gryffindor recklessness'. The recklessness of Gryffindors was proven correct in this moment as he indeed touched the flame.

"Ouch!" A shiny, red patch had formed on his finger.

"Was that really necessary?" Harry asked. Before anybody could say anything else, Madam Pince popped out from behind a shelf.

"Fire! In my library!" A flick of her wand produced a jet of water, turning the fire into a small cloud of smoke in seconds. Melanie winced, feeling the fire being exterminated. Although fire wasn't alive, it still had 'states/feelings.' Right then, it had been essentially killed.

Madam Pince turned towards the four first years. "Out! Out!" A floating feather duster appeared over their heads, whacking them lightly and shooing them out. Not wanting to be hit with a feather duster more than necessary, they gathered up their belongings and rushed out of the library.

"What if I'm never allowed back in the library?" moaned Hermione, biting her lip in worry.

"A true Ravenclaw's nightmare," quipped Ron, ducking as Hermione reached out to slap his head.

"I'll talk to Madam Pince tomorrow," Melanie promised. She held up her right palm and a fire flickered to life on it.

"How can you do that?" questioned Harry.

"How can you do magic?" Melanie retorted. "I just can."

"Have you always been able to?" Hermione asked.

"Well, not really. I mean, I couldn't get burned before when I cooked and I couldn't burn anything unless I wanted to. Does that count?" At that, Harry remembered how Melanie had reached her hand in to pick out the pieces of egg shell when they'd first 'met'.

"Can you do anything like that, Harry?" Ron looked at his hand as if fire was going to start burning on it. Harry merely shrugged, replying that he hadn't really tried and he wasn't sure what it would be if he could do anything like it.

"Well, if I had anything like this, it wouldn't be fire 'cause I've burned myself before."

Their conversation was interrupted by an angry Professor Snape, who glided towards them, cloak billowing around him. "Is there a problem here?" purred Professor Snape, obviously happy for a chance to have an excuse to take away House points.

"Nothing, Professor. We were just leaving. I'm just going back to the Hufflepuff common room." Melanie cast a meaningful look at the other three, who nodded. With some mumbling, the four went in separate directions, leaving behind a bemused professor.

"He's such a creep," said Ron, once they'd all met up outside the Hufflepuff dorm entrance.

Hermione gasped, looking like Ron had said something rather scandalous. _Although, to Hermione, I suppose insulting a teacher is something scandalous. _"He's not that bad."

"Anyways… We really need to get a new place to meet up," Melanie said, cutting off Ron's rant about 'the creepy potion-brewing bat that lives in the dungeons'.

The next half hour passed with Hermione nagging them all about finishing their work.

Harry returned to the Slytherin common room, or at least, to the entrance of the common room. Somehow, the password ended up being 'Mudbloods'. Harry refused to use the password, instead waiting outside for somebody else to come and let him in.

After about ten minutes, which he spent counting bricks on the walls, Draco arrived. "You still don't use the password?" he scoffed, rolling his eyes.

"No; I won't use it. Did you forget that one of my best friends is a Muggleborn?"

"She's a Ravenclaw," Draco said dismissively. Harry bit back a retort as they climbed into the Common Room. Maybe not being in Slytherin entitled insults in Draco's mind; however, Harry couldn't really blame him for it over blaming his parents for their negative influence.

They climbed in to see all the first years gathered in the Common Room, studying of all things. Although they did enough work, slacking off in some subjects, Slytherins were no Ravenclaws.

"What's going on?" asked Draco. "You're all acting like Granger."

That caused some laughter, even from Harry who had to admit that Hermione was a bit over the top.

"Professor Snape told us that there's going to be a pop quiz in Potions tomorrow," Blaise informed the other two, who'd both been out when the professor had told everybody.

"It isn't a pop quiz anymore, is it?" Harry asked, slightly peeved at how Snape acted.

The other Slytherins shrugged, not protesting against their advantage. Harry wondered whether or not to bring up the unfairness of this, but decided to just start studying. After all, Snape didn't have to take points to insult Harry's intelligence, or lack of.

Maybe it was fair, in a way. They got an advantage from their teacher, which countered the slight disadvantages from the other Houses.

~.~.~.~.~

"I can't believe him! A pop quiz just a month before Christmas!" Ron protested.

Melanie rolled her eyes. "Your logic is infallible."

"A month is quite a long time, Ron," defended Hermione. Tests and homework were what she loved.

"Still," said Ron, pouting. "Harry, I noticed that none of the Slytherins were too surprised by the surprise."

"Yeah. Snape told us about it just yesterday. I would've told you if I had the chance to." At Ron's mock pout, Harry continued. "I heard that he was going to have another pop quiz the day before the winter break. This one will be identifying some ingredients and combinations and stuff like that." That started Hermione's string of questions about the exact date, the exact questions, the exact time limit, the exact everything.

Melanie took the opportunity to outside the room and make sure that nobody was listening in. It could lead to awkward questions if they saw fires spontaneously burning around her. At least Madam Pince had let them back into the library. She'd even given them a room, but Melanie suspected that it was only because there were no books in them for her to burn.

Since Halloween, Melanie had been playing around with her fire powers wherever and wherever possible. So far, there'd been a few dozen inexplicable incidents, one of which involved everybody's meals being burnt to a crisp.

"Mel, did you hear that?"

"Huh? Sorry, Harry. What were you saying?"

"He was just asking whether you say that greasy git on Halloween." At Melanie's blank look, Ron added, "You know… Before the troll in the washroom?"

She tried to think back but couldn't recall seeing him down there. "No, why are you guys wondering this now?" Now that she thought about it, she knew that Harry and Ron had seen him as they were sneaking down to try and warn the two girls.

Harry shared a look with Ron, who said, "We saw him down there. Maybe he was the one who let the troll into Hogwarts!" When nobody agreed or disagreed, Ron continued, "Well, he was the one who jinxed Harry's Nimbus."

"Maybe," Melanie said. She could feel Harry's suspicion from her memories, but something was off. She'd kept mental files about people, and something big was missing from the Severus Snape one.

**{A/N This chapter done. So… Read and review. :D Pleaseeeee… *continues for 5 minutes.*}**

**~ScalleneGalleons~**


	9. Bad Luck

**{A/N Chapter Nine. Glad you like Melanie, ThatElusiveReader. :D}**

_I'd like to see if Peeves is resistant to fire._ Melanie scowled. This was the tenth time this week that Peeves had pelted her with various items, including ones that he had stolen from her dorm.

"PEEVES GET BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!" The other students in the hallway froze as she sprinted past them, aiming jets of light at Peeves. Melanie frowned; she was trying to do some hexes. Obviously, that wasn't working because whatever the lights hit, it would just act like a beam of light.

Eventually, Peeves got tired of her chasing him and screaming. He decided to give her bag of stuff back to her; by dropping it on her head.

"Ouch!" As the poltergeist turned to go away, she shouted, "I'm going to get you!"

That made the poltergeist cackle, overturning everything in his way.

Thankfully, Melanie had managed to eat something before Peeves had lured her away from the Great Hall with her stuff. It took her about half an hour to tidy up the chaos that Peeves had left behind him, which resulted in her being late for Charms.

"Five points from Hufflepuff for tardiness," squeaked Professor Flitwick. All the Hufflepuffs looked at her sympathetically, having heard of the fiasco with Peeves.

"At least it wasn't Potions; Snape would've taken a billion points from Hufflepuff," whispered Susan as Melanie took her seat next to the Hufflepuff.

From the other side of her, Hermione asked, "What happened with Peeves?"

Melanie whispered the entire story to Hermione, who was also taking notes somehow. Today's class was covering 'Incendio' which Melanie had absolutely no use for. After all, why bother with the spell? She could just point her wand, say the incantation and create a fire where she was aiming.

When Professor Flitwick came around, that was exactly what she did though her timing with the fire was a little earlier.

"I hope Professor Flitwick doesn't suspect anything," Melanie whispered to Hermione. The professor did seem a little curious for a second, but chose not to comment.

At lunch that day, Melanie only just managed to keep her bag of stuff away from Peeves, who seemed to have made it his personal challenge to see how many times he could get Melanie to scream at him or throw objects around her at him.

"Hey, Harry? Ron? Hermione?" The three turned to look at her. "Do you guys want to help me get revenge?"

The two boys nodded, but Hermione looked wary. "Revenge on who?"

Melanie pouted. "Promise to help me?" Hermione nodded reluctantly, and Melanie smirked. "Great, 'cause I need to get revenge on Peeves!"

"WHAT?!" The entire school froze, staring at Ron, who had yelled. The Hufflepuffs around them stared, while Draco Malfoy could be heard from the Slytherin table making fun of Ron's shriek.

"You heard me. You all promised! I need to prank a poltergeist; any ideas?"

In the end, the prank wasn't really a prank. She just cornered Peeves and cast various beams of light at him before trying, and failing, to burn him. Before the poltergeist left, he'd just laughed at her attempts to do something, anything, in revenge.

"Thank you for all the help," Melanie growled at the three others, who had watched the whole scene behind the wall. They'd chickened out at the last second but stayed for 'moral support' ('we-don't-want-to-get-discovered-but-we're-still- here-for-you).

"That's what I'm here for," said Ron. Another glare from Melanie stopped him from saying anything else, but Harry burst into laughter.

"I'm sorry… but did you really… just try… to hex a poltergeist?" Harry's laughter was catching, and soon Hermione and Ron had also joined in. Melanie pouted, but relented as the four of them collapsed onto the floor, laughing and holding their stomachs.

"PEEVES!" A bottle of ink had been thrown at the wall over their heads, causing it to break and spill everywhere.

"Can't catch me!"

Of course, the ink meant that she was late for another class as she had to go back to her dorm to clean it off and get new clothes. As if being late for two classes wasn't bad enough, the second class was indeed Potions.

_Would it have been worse to show up inked?_ A moment's internal debate, and she decided that Snape probably would've sent her back for 'not being prepared for Potions class properly' or something like that. _Peeves…_

"Glad to see you've finally decided to grace us with your presence, Miss Potter." Sarcasm was practically oozing out of the professor's words.

Any other day, Melanie would've stayed quiet. Today, the badly veiled taunt was enough to make her snap, "You need not feel so honoured that I'm here."

The temperature in the classroom dropped ten degrees as professor Snape turned around. "Ten points from Hufflepuff for your insolence." True to their House loyalty, no Hufflepuffs groaned at the loss of House points.

"Now, perhaps you can explain to us all why you were late." Melanie walked calmly over to sit by Hermione. "Miss Potter?" She put her bag down beside the table, taking out her quill and books. Melanie was stopped in her act of opening her book when Snape's hand came slamming down on the cover. "Well?"

Melanie glared at him; a person had no right to mistreat others and still expect respect. She considered ignoring him again but didn't really feel like suffering through a detention with him. Besides, Potions was still an interesting subject, one which she was looking forward to getting to that lesson.

"Peeves decided it would be funny to throw a bottle of ink at me, sir." She looked him straight in the eye, matching his cold expression. A second later, Professor Snape was back at the front of the classroom, lecturing them about the potion they were required to make.

"Bloody stupid professors," Melanie mumbled to herself as she left the classroom. It turned out that an angry Snape was one that would assign extra work.

"Well, you really shouldn't have cheeked him," Hermione reprimanded, cowering slightly as Melanie turned her furious gaze onto her.

"He was asking for it. 'Glad to see you've finally graced us with your presence.'"

"Oh, you know it's just Snape. He hates everybody."

"Everybody outside of Slytherin, you mean." Melanie could tell that Snape hated Harry from two sets of memories and proof whenever she'd catch him glaring at her brother. Apparently, Snape couldn't bear to take even one point from his own House. "Biased git."

"Almost makes you wish you were Sorted into Slytherin, huh?" Hermione joked.

"Why would you ever want to be Sorted into Slytherin, Hermione?" asked Ron, nudging Harry. They two boys had spotted the other two in the hallway and snuck up behind them.

"Hey, Ronald, Slytherin isn't a bad House," Harry said, smirking when Ron winced a little at the use of his full name. At the doubtful looks when he defended Slytherin, he added, "Well, the people are quite horrid, but the House itself isn't bad. It means that we think before we act and we can trick people, unlike brash, bold Gryffindors."

"Harry, don't bash Gryffindors," tutted Melanie mockingly, cheering up slightly. "You _are_ a Gryffindor at heart." Harry placed a hand over his head and smiled.

"We're all Gryffindors at heart," stated Hermione.

"Ugh. Please don't ever say that again." _Draco Malfoy,_ Melanie thought, torn between amusement and defensiveness at how much he didn't want to be in Gryffindor.

"What are you doing here Malfoy?" _What's with the Malfoy-Weasley rivalry?_

"Contrary to your belief, you do not own Harry."

"Git."

"Weasel."

"Idiot."

"Ars-"

"HEY!" yelled Harry. The two stopped arguing and faced him.

"Honestly, you two argue like five year-olds." Hermione rolled her eyes.

"We do not!" Melanie laughed as they glared at each other, having said the same thing at the same time.

"Could you two, please, try to not, like, kill each other? Please?" pleaded Harry. Reluctantly, the five walked towards the Great Hall for dinner.

_This is going to be an odd dinner,_ thought Melanie. Draco had decided that he should sit with the other four, so they'd settled on sitting at the Slytherin table, much to the displeasure of all the other Slytherins.

"Weasley, Granger, Potter," Theodore Nott said, sounding slightly scornful. Melanie and Harry shared a grin as they both responded to 'Potter'.

"Not you, Potter. You, Potter!" That only succeeded in confusing and amusing them further.

"Never mind; just call me Melanie and him Harry."

Theodore nodded, then reluctantly said, "Call me Theodore. That doesn't apply to you, Mudblood, or you, traitor."

That caused some yelling from Harry, Melanie, Ron and Hermione. Apparently, four yelling first years, three of which could do magic competently enough was intimidating because Theodore ended up apologizing, albeit unwillingly.

Though, he still ended up having to eat a burnt dinner.

**{A/N This chapter was probably really short and kinda like a filler. I can't really think of anything that could contribute to the plot until about Christmas, and I didn't want to pass over months without some little bits. Next chapter will most likely be Christmas. Am I supposed to capitalize 'Professor?' [[[EDIT: Disregard that question about capitalizing 'Professor'.]]]}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	10. Christmas Dream

**{A/N Chapter Ten. Christmas and wintertime.}**

Winter was finally taking Fall's place. Snow layered up onto Hogwart's grounds until the younger students had to find an already made path to get outside without being buried alive. The weather dropped considerably and suddenly, catching some unaware by giving them colds.

Melanie was the only person in the castle who didn't seem to get sick, which Hermione thought was due to her fire powers. The people that didn't know about her powers were completely at a loss at how she could go out in short sleeves, looking no more than slightly chilled.

"I think the professors expect me to drop dead whenever I go outside," she remarked to Hermione the day before Christmas.

Steadily, the Great Hall had been filled with various decorations and pine trees. Each table also had a tree at the end of their table, so there were five trees with strange decorations. The Weasley twins had even managed to put a firecracker at the top of the Gryffindor tree, warning people that if it was moved in the slightest, it would be set off. The other seven trees had various items on them, looking more like proper Christmas trees than a shelf for kids to put their unused items.

"Well, you should at least wear a sweater if you don't want anybody to notice."

She pouted. "But then I'll feel too warm."

"What? I thought you were controlling it."

Melanie cursed herself for letting that slip. It seriously confused her as well, and she didn't feel like being the subject of Hermione's examinations about why this was happening.

"Er… Yeah, I mean-"

"You mean you can't control it?" Hermione looked like she already had a dozen theories that she was willing to test out.

"It's not a big deal," she protested, a little too loudly as they headed towards Harry and Ron, who were bickering about something at the Slytherin table.

"What's not a big deal?" questioned Harry.

Before Melanie could stop her, Hermione said, "Melanie can't control how she's so warm all the time."

"It's not a big deal!"

Ron shrugged, half-agreeing with Melanie. "I mean, as long as she's not getting sick or anything, I don't see the problem?"

"The problem is that-" Harry made a shushing noise as the Slytherins, those who had stayed at Hogwarts during the winter break, around them leaned in to hear the big problem. "The problem is that if anybody were to accidentally brush again her, she'd be burning up."

"Oh… That could be a problem."

"Mel, what's happening?"

"Harry, I told Hermione: I don't know." She reached her hand out and touched Harry's, which was slightly chilly despite the sweater he was wearing. However, to her, it felt like an ice block and he recoiled as if he was burned. _That's probably what it feels like to him._

In turn, she reached out to touch Hermione and Ron's hands, both reacting the same way as Harry did.

"Bloody hell!" Ron rubbed his hand over his other one, which was sporting a red, shiny mark.

"Did I burn you?"

"No, this was somebody else whose temperature is higher than a dragon's. Yes, it was you." Despite his sarcasm, Ron didn't seem angry, only confused and interested.

"Whoops," she said, grinning slightly as Ron stuck his tongue out childishly.

"You're practically a dragon. You've got the heat and the temper."

"What are you then? A strawberry with red hair for colouring and freckles for seeds?" Ron chucked an ice cube from his drink at her, only to have it melt the second it touched her skin.

"That's insane," Harry said, staring at the small patch of soaked fabric where the ice had melted into. Melanie concentrated, and the wet spot was gone in an instant.

Luckily for her, dinner was over at that point and Melanie retreated back to the Hufflepuff dorms before Hermione could ask anything.

~.~.~.~.~

Melanie lay tossing and turning in her bed, unable to sleep. Unlike the others in Hogwarts, this was not because of the excitement that Christmas brought. Her thoughts were racing a mile a minute.

_Something's going to happen at the end of this year, but for a reason I don't know, I don't know what's going to happen! What's the point of the Sorting Hat giving me memories if the most important ones are held back!? _She huffed and rolled over, playing the Sorting Hat's words in her mind. Between her two Sortings, the only words that changed were the ones where it had said to look after her brother.

_That's brings up another point: why the hell am I in Hufflepuff? _Melanie considered going into the Gryffindor dorms for a moment, just to see the reactions. After all, she knew all the passwords, past, present, and future. _It would be so much easier if we were all in Gryffindor…_

**Easier perhaps, but not what's needed.**

Melanie bit back a yelp of surprise. The Voice in her head again, the same one that had told her to go after Hermione on Halloween.

_Er… Hello? s_he thought, feeling extremely foolish doing so.

**Merry Christmas, Melanie.** Definitely not her conscience then. Guessing from the pitch of the voice, she'd say it was the voice of a male that might be graduating from Hogwarts.

_Technically, it's not Christmas yet._ She could practically feel the Voice rolling its non-existent eyes, which would've been quite a sight.

**Yes, yes; I know.**

_Who are you?_

There was moment of pause as the Voice seemed to be internally debating (while being inside her head) whether or not he/it should answer. **Steven.**

_Merry early Christmas, Steven. _The conversation in her head stopped abruptly there, leaving her wondering if she was insane. After all, it was either she'd had a conversation with herself but the other her was using a male voice in her head, or she was having a conversation with a voice in her head that wasn't hers.

Her sanity was well deserved of being questioned.

Eventually, her thoughts slowed down as she adopted the Muggle technique of counting sheep (_Do wizards count dragons or something?_). That was when she began to dream.

**_'Everything's so foggy," she said aloud, hoping that somebody would hear._**

**_"Are you sure? We could wait until tomorrow…" A male voice, sounding rather like the Voice in her head._**

**_"I'm sure." Those two words were spoke by a female._**

**_'Sounds like me, but older. That's odd.' She'd had plenty of weird dreams, but never ones about her future self talking about something that seemed rather important to a Voice that she heard in her head._**

**_"Before you ask again, I'm absolutely sure." 'Steven' chuckled as 'Melanie' predicted just what he was going to say. "Now, where's the potion?"_**

**_Clink. Clink. Clink. The sound of bottles being moved and pushed against each other._**

**_"Are you ready?"_**

**_"I've been preparing for over a year," said 'Steven' in a mock-offended tone. "Of course I'm ready!" He began to chant some words, but a loud BOOM interrupted him._**

**_Approximately a dozen or so new voices joined their conversation, all yelling over each other. There was one voice that stood out and made Melanie feel rather sad, for some reason._**

**_"Put the vial down!"_**

**_"Nope," 'she' said. A pause, then more loud shouting._**

**_Throughout all the yelling, everybody failed to notice that 'Steven' was still chanting, though much quieter than before._**

**_"What's all the noise?" A male voice, older than anybody else present. Creaks and thumps as two people walked down the stairs._**

**_"Mom! Dad! Don't-"_**

**_'Mom? Dad?' Melanie was confused. Lily and James Potter were dead… weren't they?_**

**_A short pause again, then a new female voice called out, "Do what you need to."_**

**_Scuffling, bangs and cracks were heard. 'Are they fighting?'_**

**_"NO!" Two thuds. The fog dispersed quickly as a bright flash of light cleared it, effectively waking Melanie up._**

_What just happened? _She seemed to be asking herself that quite a lot recently. Running over the events of her dream in her mind so she wouldn't lose them, she got ready. When she was sure that she wouldn't forget a single detail of her dream, she exited the Hufflepuff dorms.

"Oh… It's Christmas." And she was the last one to leave the dorm. There wasn't a single person in the hallways as everybody seemed to be in the Great Hall. It was rather disorientating how she'd feel déjà vu whenever she saw something new in Hogwarts.

The four House tables that were usually in the Great Hall were not there. Instead, there was one rather large table where everybody sat, although Melanie noticed that they still seemed to sit next their own House members. Those who had to sit at the 'intersections' between Houses looked rather displeased and uneasy.

Everybody stopped to look at her. _Is it possible to be late to Christmas breakfast when they're not taking attendance?_

"Merry Christmas!" yelled Melanie as joyously as she could. Thankfully, that got the attention away from her and back to the food.

"Where were you?" asked Ron.

"Sleeping."

"We would've gotten you, but none of us know the Hufflepuff entrance," Hermione apologized.

"It was rather amusing having to go into the Gryffindor Common Rooms to drag this lazy lump out of bed," teased Harry, pointing at Ron.

"Excuse me if some of us like to sleep." Ron sniffed in a Draco-like manner, tilting his head up and looking haughty. The four of them dissolved into loud laughter which stopped when Professor Snape, who seemed to detest joy, laughter and all things human, glared at them.

"Git," Harry, Ron and Melanie said in synchronization. Each received a slap on the arm from Hermione.

The food seemed to have been prepared with extra care, either because it was Christmas or because there was less of it to prepare. Still, that didn't stop the fact that whoever made the food made more than enough to feed five ravenous families. That meant that Ron could eat to his heart's content. How much he could each astonished and slightly disgusted the others, though they laughed it off.

After breakfast, they all agreed to get their presents and head into the Gryffindor Common Room, after much protesting on Harry's part ("A Slytherin going into the Gryffindor Common Room is like running around, parading with a Gryffindor banner!").

**{A/N If that Steven thing was weird, whoops? XD It's part of the overall plot thing… Read and review. :D Even saying 'I'm reading this' is enough to make me happy. **

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	11. The Magic Mirror

**{A/N Chapter Eleven. I'm planning to finish this by March-ish, hopefully. I have the next few chapters written out, so there'll probably be more updates (don't hold me on any promises though, as I suck with commitments XD). Anyways, onto the chapter!}**

_Invisibility Cloak, Library, random classroom, Mirror of Erised. _

Melanie couldn't help but wonder what she'd see in the Mirror. Ever since her dream, everything had felt out of place. Maybe she should go with Harry to the Mirror?But then, she'd have to explain how she knew. Saying 'I know the future' to somebody, even if that person was her brother, would probably get her a one-way ticket to an asylum.

What would she see in the Mirror? Would she see her family like Harry? But that didn't feel right to her.

The next morning, Harry looked distracted. _This is the first time he's seen his parents…_ She cursed her aunt and uncle for not even showing them a simple picture. It was simply the 'Harry Potter patented luck' that while going to the Restricted Section of the library, he didn't get caught but merely gotten entranced with a magical mirror.

_Nicolas Flamel wouldn't be in the Restricted Section. _Puzzling over how she knew that, she realized something. _I know about him…_

She sifted through her memories, which was a rather difficult task as it felt like holding sand. Each individual grain of sand was a memory and she had to pick them out (was she using her hands to pick out the grains or metaphorical buckets and shovels?). Melanie wasn't sure if this was normal, but worked, nonetheless.

_Nicolas Flamel._ Several memories changed colour in response to her thought and she picked those out. _This definitely isn't normal, _she thought, laughing under her breath as a few grains of sand lit up when somebody said those words.

She picked out a random grain of sand. _Nicolas Flamel... Found on the back of Dumbledore's Chocolate Frog card._

'Considered by many the greatest wizard of modern times, Dumbledore is particularly famous for his defeat of the Dark Wizard Grindelwald in 1945, for the discovery of the twelve uses of dragons blood, and his work on alchemy with his partner Nicolas Flamel. Professor Dumbledore enjoys chamber music and ten-pin bowling.'

_So Flamel was… is an alchemist. Still alive at the age of… OVER 600 YEARS? Married to… Wait no, that's not important right now. What did he make that would need to be kept safe at Hogwarts? _Thinking that, she face-palmed, much to the surprise, alarm, and amusement of those who saw her. _OF COURSE! The Philosopher's Stone._

_The Philosopher's Stone: immortal elixirs and turning things to gold. Riches and immortal life: the two things that so many people want._

She was brought out of her memory 'sand box' as Harry called her name.

"Yeah? Sorry, I was kinda spaced out for a second."

"We realized," Hermione said. "You were muttering something about Hogwarts and gold."

Those just had to be the words she said out loud… "Listen, I think I know who Nicolas Flamel is."

Hermione listened raptly as Melanie recounted everything that she'd 'remembered/realized'. This was rather early in the timeline, but it was better to know earlier.

"Gold and immortality? That's why Snape's after it!" accused Ron, prompting an eye roll from Melanie.

_Snape's innocent,_ she thought, not saying it out loud. None of them would believe her, and then they'd wonder how she knew it.

_Asylum, _she reminded herself, only just managing to close her mouth and stop from blurting out everything.

The rest of the day was spent with them bickering, playing games and talking in the Gryffindor Common Room. At first, all three of them felt enthusiastic when Ron suggested chess. They ended up regretting their enthusiasm as Ron creamed them one by one. After another few games where they all lost terribly, they ended up discussing Nicolas Flamel, Snape and the giant black dog guarding the area ("Maybe we should go see it." "DON'T BE STUPID, RONALD!").

That night, when she was back in her dorm, she had a 'vision'.

**_Ron and Harry in front of the Mirror._**

**_"See?" whispered Harry._**

**_"I can't see anything," said Ron, frowning at the Mirror._**

**_"Look! Look at them all… there are loads of them…" Melanie grinned at his description of what was in the Mirror; he'd told Ron that the Mirror showed family members._**

**_They switched places to look into the mirror, making Melanie feel rather bad for Ron as he said that he saw himself better than his siblings._**

**_They started arguing about who should get to look into the Mirror, leading them to leave them room as they heard a noise._**

~.~.~.~.~

Melanie could hear muffled words through the door. This morning, when she'd seen Harry looking more distracted than ever, she'd decided that it was time for her to get involved. She'd decided to go in with Harry, only remembering that Dumbledore was there when she'd been about to open the door after Harry. Quickly, she'd stepped back around a corner. At that place, she'd managed to hear some snatches of their conversation.

Harry exited the room, nearly giving his sister a heart attack in the process. She could see the cloak fluttering around his ankles, giving away his shoes. Although the cloak was rather big on him, it was scrunched up around his shoulders.

Her natural curiosity warred with her sense of privacy for the headmaster. Melanie's curiosity won over as she inched closer to the door. Through the crack between the door and the door frame, she could see that Dumbledore was facing the Mirror. _What does he see? _

Abandoning looking through the crack, she pressed her ear against the door, careful not to move it.

"Ariana…"

_Ariana?_

Dumbledore seemed to be done looking into the mirror, turning abruptly and walking towards the door Melanie was hiding behind. Stifling a small squeak, she sprinted down the hallway and around the corner. For a moment, Dumbledore stopped, looking in the direction she'd run. Shrugging it off, he continued on his way.

When she was sure that the Headmaster was far enough not to hear her, Melanie walked into the room with the Mirror.

"What am I going to see?" At the current moment, she couldn't really think of anything that she wanted too badly.

Family wouldn't exactly feel right, because she was sure that she had one.

Money? The Potter vault was filled.

Immortality? Watching all her friends die would be the worst.

A world without Voldemort (who definitely wasn't dead and had somebody trying to steal the Philosopher's Stone for him) would be nice, but how would that look in the Mirror? She definitely didn't want to see a rotting carcass.

Hoping she wouldn't see a carcass of a mass murderer, Melanie leaned forwards to look in the Mirror.

_Is the Mirror broken?_

All she saw was a reflection of herself. Red hair, hazel eyes, surprised and confused expression.

Wasn't the Mirror supposed to show some wish of hers?

~.~.~.~.~

"When is something going to happen?" Melanie complained to herself. Not that she wanted anybody to get hurt, but this waiting was aggravating. Somebody was going to try to steal the Philosopher's Stone at the end of the year, and she was sitting in classes.

For the next Quidditch match, it would go as normal. However, the three of them knew that, under different circumstances, Snape would've refereed. They were still suspicious of that possibility, which they learned from their memories, which meant that Hermione jumped on the chance to make all four of them learn the Leg-Locker curse. Eventually, Melanie was able to cast the spell somewhat effectively. There was one incident when she'd been trying to practice the spell against Ron and the spell had pushed him into a summersault.

After the match, Melanie watched as Harry discovered (through his memories) that Snape was 'threatening' Quirrell. The odd thing about their memories was that the time difference between them seemed to be closing. As well, they had started to get less and less clear.

At that rate, Melanie theorized that their memories would be gone by the end of the year, though her memories of a world where she didn't exist were still fine.

Harry pulled them aside into an empty classroom, telling them about what he would overhear. _Now they'll only accuse Snape even more than usual._ That thought made her feel like bashing her head in with a baseball bat (or the Beater's bat). She abandoned them to their accusations, choosing to sit by the Lake instead.

Perhaps it wasn't wise to sit by the Lake, what with her fire powers, but it was a calming spot. Watching the water ripples spread across the lake from the creatures moving around in it, she focused into her mind.

_Steven? _No response. _Steven!_ No response. _I know you're there. Where could you escape to? This is my mind, after all._

**Yes? **He sounded amused.

_Why didn't I see anything in the Mirror of Erised? _That was the question that had been dominating her mind for quite a long time. On occasion, she asked Steven about it, who had in turn said some vague things about it 'not being time for her to know'.

_Cut the 'it's not time' stuff, _thought Melanie, anticipating his response. A long pause occurred before she asked, _Well?_

**Well what?**

_You know very well what._

**Actually, I don't. You told me to stop telling you it's not time, but if it isn't time, there isn't anything else I can tell you. **Okay, he was definitely amused now.

_Well-what-you-seriously-GUH. _That was the day that Melanie learned that it was possible to be lost for thoughts. And that it felt similar to be lost for words.

_Well, if you're not going to tell me about the Mirror, could you at least help me with my Potions essay?_

She pulled the essay out in front of her. Somehow, Steven saw it, whether it was through her eyes or not.** Ah, yes. This essay is one that's given out every year. Now, this is what you need to write…**

**{A/N By the way, I sometimes switch POVs in the middle of the chapter. If it confuses you, sorry, but it shouldn't be too hard to notice. Usually, the person's POV will have their name included in it the most. I haven't done a Hermione POV yet, and I'm not sure if I will this story. Maybe second year?**

**Also, thanks to That Elusive Reader for another review. :D I clap every time I see the review number go up. Glad to know you're reading, and, yes, it is odd that Steven even exists. . A dragon child… *ponders idea.* That would be interesting XD**

**Read and review, pleaseeeeeeeee *goes on for five minutes* I'll give you virtual brownies!}**


	12. A Dragon!

**{A/N Chapter Twelve. I've pretty much written out the rest of the story, so expect more updates that just once a week for the next few weeks. I kind of just want to put the story as completed to feel accomplished. XD}**

The conversation had started off innocently enough. Draco and Harry had been talking about Quidditch, mainly about how rubbish the Gryffindor team was at the minute.

"So, where were you during the match anyways?"

"Oh. I was just in the library with Hermione, Ron and Melanie." Harry didn't mention that it was just too painful for him to watch the Gryffindor team play with such a horrible Seeker. _Well, maybe the Seeker isn't too horrible…_ He was extremely biased, after all.

Draco groaned. "I still don't understand why you hand out with a Mudblood and a blood traitor."

The temperature in the room seemed to drop several degrees as Harry fixed the blond Slytherin under a furious glare. He counted to ten in his mind, to ensure that he wouldn't start yelling at Draco.

"Do you believe that blonds are dumb?" The question took Draco off guard.

"Uh… No." He fingered a lock of his hair. "In case you haven't realized…"

"What would you do if somebody called you dumb because if your hair colour?" Draco's expression was enough to give Harry a clue of what he would do. "If hair colour doesn't matter, then why does blood?"

Draco had never really considered it. The fact that Purebloods were superior was something that had been 'trained' into him from birth. Never had he questioned it like he'd never questioned whether or not he needed to breathe. Harry saying this was the equivalent of being told that oxygen was optional.

A pause while he was thinking, then he started sputtering random words. "Because - what kind of question – how - why would - because."

"Because? That's your answer?"

"Because their blood isn't pure."

"Last time I checked, nobody here has anything other than blood as a substitute for it."

"Not pure magical blood!"

"What's pure magical blood?"

The conversation stopped there, with Draco looking rather frustrated and confused and Harry looking triumphant. A few minutes later, they restarted their Quidditch debate.

~.~.~.~.~

"Hermione… The exams are ages away." This was the third time that Ron had said that during that week.

"Ten weeks! That's not ages; that's like a second to Nicolas Flamel."

"But we're not six hundred years old. Anyways, what are you studying for, you already know-" Here he stopped, noticing the 'stop-talking' warning that Melanie was giving to him. He hadn't stopped early enough, however, for Hermione lectured them about how important that these exams were.

Unfortunately, the teachers also had a Hermione-like mindset (or perhaps Hermione had a teacher-like mindset). Homework was being piled on like leaf piles in autumn. Easter holidays were filled with Hermione trying to memorize more than the third year curriculum provided. While Melanie studied along with Hermione, Harry and Ron were lazily trying to get through all their work, rather reluctantly.

The only reason that they were doing their work in the library instead of being outside (_The sky's so blue, _Ron thought wistfully) was Hermione's death glares and threats to stop helping them.

Ron had clearly had enough of working, choosing to stare out the window. "I'll never remember all this!"

"Might as well try," said Harry, rather unsympathetically due to the fact that he was trying to look up 'Dittany' in one of his books. Ron's gaze went around the room, eventually landing on the door. He stood up, crossed their 'private room' and saw Hagrid in the library.

"Hagrid? What are you doing in the library?" At this, the other three in the room walked over as well.

Harry's attention was drawn to Hagrid's arms, which were behind his back, clutching something he was trying to hide.

"Jus' lookin'," he said, trying much too hard to sound relaxed. "An' what're you lot up ter?"

The girls said, "Studying," at the same time that the two boys said, "Being forced to be bored."

"Good, good." Hagrid seemed rather distracted and then looked at their pile of books suspiciously. "Yer not still lookin' fer Nicolas Flamel, are yeh?"

"Oh, we found out about him ages ago," said Ron. "And we know that the dog's guarding the Philosoph-"

"Shhhh!" Hagrid looked around to make sure that nobody had heard what Ron was saying. "Don' go shoutin' about it, what's the matter with yeh?"

"There are a few things we wanted to ask you, as a matter of fact," said Harry, ignoring Hagrid's shushing Ron. "What's guarding the Stone apart from Fluffy-"

"SHHHHHH! No sense, yeh firs' years." That second part was mumbled, rather unnecessarily as he was speaking into their small, private room.

"Listen, come an' see me later. I'm not promisin' I'll tell yeh anythin', mind, but don' go rabbitin' about it in here, students aren' s'pposed ter know. They'll think I've told yeh-"

"See you later then," said Harry, cutting off a lecture from Hagrid, who looked rather relieved to leave.

"What was he hiding behind his back?" asked Hermione.

"Do you think it had anything to do with the Stone?"

"Probably not. After all, if Dumbledore hid the Stone here, why would Hagrid need to research anything if he could just ask Dumbledore?" Melanie pointed out.

Ron looked around the library. Hagrid had been lingering by _that _particular shelf…

Ron stood up, walking over to the shelf and looking for the gaps. The books on either side would be the ones that would have the closest topics to it. _Dragons…_

"Dragons!" he whispered, careful to not attract the attention of Madam Pince. "Hagrid was looking up stuff about dragons!"

_Possibilities: Curiousity? Maybe, but why now in particular? Not likely. Random reading? Why all the books from that section? Less likely that curiousity. _There was one option he didn't really want to consider, but ended up piecing it together.

"He has a dragon…" Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Melanie look at him in surprise. _Not surprise that Hagrid has a dragon… Surprise that I figured it out?_ He felt slightly insulted.

"WHAT?! Oh, sorry, Madam Pince." Hermione ducked her head into her book to pretend that she hadn't been yelling just a second ago.

"Hagrid's always wanted a dragon; he told me so the first time I ever met him," supplied Harry.

"Well, this is Hagrid. He'd be crazy enough to go get one," said Melanie, fondly and exasperatedly.

"But it's against our laws," said Ron. "Dragon breeding was outlawed by the Warlocks' Convention of 1709, everyone knows that. It's hard to stop Muggles from noticing us if we're keeping dragons in the back garden - anyway, you can't tame dragons, it's dangerous. You should see the burns Charlie's got off wild ones in Romania."

"But there aren't wild dragons in Britain?" said Harry.

"Of course there are," said Ron. "Common Welsh Green and Hebridean Blacks. The Ministry of Magic has a job hushing them up, I can tell you. Our kind have to keep putting spells on Muggles who've spotted them, to make them forget."

"So what on earth's Hagrid up to?" said Hermione.

"I think Ron's said it," Melanie agreed. "He's got a dragon." _Why isn't she surprised? _Ron wondered.

An hour later, they knocked on the door of the gamekeeper's hut. The curtains were closed and looked like they were pinned in place by something. _How much more obvious could Hagrid make this? _If Ron had been in this situation, he definitely would've chosen a different place and not shut his usually open hut down.

"Who is it?"

"You told us to come here…" said Melanie. The door swung open and he ushered them in quickly.

"Come on, come- on." As soon as they were in, he shut the door and locked it. "Yeh wanted to ask me somethin'?"

"Yes," Harry confirmed. "We were wondering if you could tell us what else is guarding the Philosopher's Stone besides Fluffy."

"Yes. What defence is there for this super valuable stone besides a man-eating dog?" asked Ron.

Hagrid cracked a smile at them before frowning.

"O' course I can't. Number one, I don' know meself. Number two, yeh know too much already, although how yer know tha' is still a mystery. I wouldn' tell yeh if I could. That Stone's here fer a good reason. It was almost stolen outta of Gringotts. I s'ppose yeh've worked that out an' all? Beats me how yeh even know abou' Fluffy."

"These three idiots almost got eaten by that giant dog," Melanie muttered. She was elbowed in the ribs by Harry and Ron, who clearly didn't want Hagrid to know that.

"Oh, come on Hagrid." Ron saw Melanie smile at Hermione's warm, flattering tone. "You might not want to tell us, but you do know, you know everything that goes on around here." Here she stopped to smile and flutter her eyelashes, much to the surprise of Ron and Harry. "We only wondered who had done the guarding, really. I mean, who else Dumbledore had trusted enough to help him, apart from you." Here, Ron could see that Melanie was literally holding back tears of laughter. She turned around, took a deep breath and then turned back, composed.

Even if Hermione was laying on the praise rather thick, Hagrid chest swelled at the words. _That worked?_

"Well, I don' s'ppose it could hurt ter tell yeh that… Let's see… He borrowed Fluffy from me… then some o' the teachers did enchantements… Professor Sprout, Professor Flitwick, Professor McGonagall, Professor Quirrel, an' Dumbledore himself." Hagrid held up six fingers, one for each defense. "Hang on, I've forgotten someone. Oh yeah, Professor Snape."

Ron and Harry shared a look. "Snape?" said Ron, suspiciously.

"Yeah," said Hagrid. Then he looked at Ron and Harry's faces. "Yer not still on abou' that are yeh?" Hagrid had a serious expression on his face now. "Look, Snape helped protect the Stone, he's not about ter steal it."

_Sure… He wouldn't pretend to protect the Stone to know all the defences so he would be able to sneak past it later… _That was what made sense, strategically speaking. After all, the professor did nothing to endear himself to anybody outside of the 'Snake's Den' (Slytherin House). Combined with what Harry had 'overheard' between Quirrell and Snape, it seemed that the professor knew how to get past all the spells except Quirrell's.

Also, it might be a problem for him to get past Fluffy as his leg wound proved.

"You're the only one who knows how to get past Fluffy, aren't you, Hagrid?" Harry sounded rather anxious. When Hagrid nodded, he continued, "And you wouldn't tell anyone, would you? Not even one of the teachers?"

"Not a soul knows except me an' Dumbledore."

Ron saw Melanie smirk knowingly. _I really have to ask her what all that's about._

"Well, that's something," Harry muttered to the others. He raised a hand and brushed his bangs back, revealing the sweat beading on his foreheard. "Hagrid, can we have a window open? It's boiling in here."

"Can't, Harry, sorry."

_I WAS RIGHT! _Hagrid's eyes had drifted towards the fireplace, which had a huge, black egg in the heart of the fire.

"Hagrid, is that-"

"HAGRID WHAT ARE YOU THINKING?" Hermione's loud voice made everybody jump a little.

"Ah. That's… er…"

"Where did you get it, Hagrid?" Ron had asked the first question that came to his mind so Hermione couldn't start ranting again. "It must've cost you a fortune." _Well, considering that it's illegal to get one, it definitely would've cost a lot._

"Won it," said Hagrid, looking at the fire with a fond smile. "Las' night. I was down in the village havin' a few drinks an' got inter a game o' cards with a stranger. Think he was quite glad ter get rid of it, ter be honest."

"Well, considering it's _illegal,_" Hermione said. She sighed resignedly. "But what are you going to do with it when it's hatched?"

"Well, I've bin doin' some readin'," said Hagrid, taking a large from that he must've gotten from the library. _I TOLD YOU SO! _Ron screamed mentally. The book was rather large and could probably fit into one of the gaps that he'd seen between the ones he'd seen on the shelf. "Got this outta the library: Dragon Breeding for Pleasure and Profit. It's a bit outta date," (_The book's old and wrinkled, as well as stained and ripped, _Ron noted) "but it's all there. Keep the egg in the fire, 'cause their mothers breath on em, see, an' when it hatches, feed it a bucket o' brandy mixed with chicken blood every half hour. An' see here, how ter recognize diff'rent eggs. What I got there's a Norwegian Ridgeback. They're rare, them."

Melanie's eyes glazed over as she gazed adoringly at the egg. _Not another Hagrid!_

"Hagrid, you live in a wooden house." Hermione's statement sounded like such an obvious one, but none of them had really thought about it.

Hagrid wasn't listening. Instead, he stoked the fire.

**{A/N The first one to be Ron-ish POV. Like it, hate it, meh?**

**Thanks again to That Elusive Reader for another lovely review. :D Glad you liked the chapter and I hope your headache's better by the time you're reading this. *throws brownies and confetti at you.* You'll find out why Melanie can't see anything in the mirror.. Eventually… Maybe never! *evil laugh.***

**If you're reading, give me a review. :D If you hate it, give me some constructive criticism. :D }**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	13. Getting Caught

**{A/N Chapter Thirteen. Dragons yay! :D Also, the previous chapter was being glitchy and it took a full day for the chapter to finally show up. Because of that, it would be nice if you guys could tell me whether or not you can actually read it? I haven't mentioned this in a few chapters: I am not J.K. Rowling.}**

"Now we have something else to worry about," Ron moaned to the others once they were out of the hut. Besides worrying about the protection of a valuable Stone, they also had to worry about an illegal dragon.

"What's the worry?" Melanie asked, smiling as she thought about the dragon.

"WHAT'S THE WORRY? HAGRID LIVES IN A WOODEN HOUSE!" That had been Hermione's argument, which she'd repeated at least a dozen times in the past half hour.

Melanie shrugged. "When can dragons start breathing fire?"

"Norwegian Ridgebacks start earlier than other breeds of dragon." She stopped for a moment, looking confused. "Um… They usually start breathing fire at around one to three months."

Melanie nodded. "So all we'll have to do is make sure than the dragon gets somewhere safe after a month."

"Sure… All we have to do is take this dragon, one that Hagrid's always wanted, away from him," said Ron sarcastically.

"Not to mention that we'll have to avoid getting bitten. That thing is poisonous, I believe." Hermione sounded like a teacher lecturing a class about dragons.

"Not a problem," said Melanie nonchalantly.

_A dragon… isn't a problem? _Ron was feeling incredulous. _I'd hate to see what she thinks is a problem…_

They'd developed a sort of routine. In the morning, wake up early and sneak out to check on Hagrid (make sure that his hut hadn't been burned down because the fireplace's fire got everywhere). Go to classes and check that his hut was still intact, in the evening.

Ron had wondered what it would be like to have a peaceful life plenty of times.

Between the Philosopher's Stone, the dragon and their extra homework, they really didn't need Hermione to draw up study schedules for them. _She's going to overwork herself one day…_

One day, at breakfast, Hedwig brought a note from Hagrid. During that time between receiving that letter and finding out that Hagrid had a dragon egg, they'd received plenty of other letters. Most of them were updates and, on occasion, him thinking that the egg was hatching but not being sure.

Today, the note couldn't be clearer. 'It's hatching.'

Beside him, Melanie let out a squeak of excitement, drawing the attention of all the Hufflepuffs around them.

"Let's just go straight to Hagrid's hut," Ron suggested.

"We can't skip class!" Unsurprisingly, that was Hermione.

Ron felt extremely exasperated. School was important, but some things were more important. "Hermione, how many times in our lives are we going to see a dragon hatching?"

"We've got lessons, we'll get into trouble, and that's nothing to what Hagrid's going to be in when someone finds out what he's doing-"

"Shut up," Harry hissed, pinching Hermione's arm.

Malfoy was a few feet behind them, looking embarrassed that he had been caught eavesdropping. "Uh… I'm, just heading to… class. Yes, class. That's where I'm going." The Slytherin was gone before they could find out how much he heard.

Ron and Melanie's combined efforts in arguing Hermione into skipping class didn't succeed, but she did end up agreeing to go with them during morning break.

_We didn't miss it!_ Ron could see his look of excitement and relief mirrored on Melanie's face. Even Harry and Hermione were grinning madly.

"It's nearly out," said Hagrid, ushering them inside and to the table.

"Shouldn't we block the window?" fretted Melanie. _Why?_ Why would somebody come now, of all times? But Hagrid got up, drawing the curtain across the window.

The air was thick with tension and excitement as the five stared intently at the dragon egg, not wanting to miss a single second. The silence was broken by loud cracks. The egg shivered, emitting _clicks _and _cracks_.

Abruptly, the egg split open. A baby dragon flopped onto the table, looking puzzled. It had a slight resemblance to an umbrella which was flicking between opening and closing. The dragon was testing out its wings, flicking them up and then folding them to its body again.

It sneezed out a few sparks, causing Hagrid to murmur, "Isn't he beautiful?" He then made the unwise decision to try and pet the dragon, nearly losing his fingers in the process.

"Bless him, look, he knows his mommy!" The other four shared a look.

"Hagrid," said Hermione, "how fast do Norwegian Ridgebacks grow, exactly?" She didn't look curious for the answer. Instead, she was fixing Hagrid under a stern glare.

Hagrid ignored the question, focusing on trying to stroke the dragon.

Now that the dragon had finally hatched, they spent even more of their time at Hagrid's hut, trying to reason with him. Hagrid's arguments seemed to be that the dragon was too little and that it would die, but that wouldn't hold out forever.

Already, it had grown three times in length in a week. Smoke was coming out of its nostrils. Ron's mental reminders that dragons couldn't breath fire until at least one month didn't prevent him from flinching away whenever it turned to face him, though, especially when it started to spit sparks.

"Fluffy and Nobert," noted Ron, shaking his head in exasperation. They'd just been informed by an overjoyed Hagrid that the dragon had a name. He'd even tried to beckon the dragon like one would a dog.

Melanie seemed to be staring at Harry whenever the situation of what they would do with Norbert came up. _Is she trying to give him a message without speaking?_

It seemed that the message worked, for Harry suddenly turned to Ron. "Charlie," he said.

Ron rolled his eyes, not sure if the smoke was getting to Harry. "You're losing it too. I'm Ron, remember?"

Now it was Harry's turn to roll his eyes. "No… Charlie, your brother. That Charlie! In Romania. Studying dragons." Harry waited for his words to have an effect. Hagrid looked torn between joy and despair, Hermione looked ecstatic, Ron was wondering why he didn't think of this solution, and Melanie was looking oddly satisfied. Harry continued speaking. "We could send Norbert to him. Charlie can take care of him and then put him back in the wild!"

"Brilliant!" exclaimed Ron. Something about how that dragon would stare at him was creeping Ron out. "How about it, Hagrid?"

It took a whole half hour of reasoning and pleading, but Hagrid eventually agreed that they could send Charlie an owl to ask him.

Now that they knew that Norbert was going to leave, a weight was lifted off their shoulders. Ron spent less time around Hagrid's hut, and Hermione went back to her frantic studying. Harry and Melanie would still constantly go back to the hut, both enamoured by the dragon.

Ron was starting to get worried that they wouldn't get a response from Charlie when Hedwig dropped a letter on Harry's toast one week later at breakfast.

Quickly, Harry shoved the note into his bag, not wanting to attract more attention that necessary. The four sighed with relief as they read through the note.

"So Hagrid's hut won't burn down!" Hermione smiled.

~.~.~.~.~

"You stepped on me!" Ron crouched down, rubbing his foot.

"Sorry, sorry," muttered Hermione, looking around them worriedly to make sure that nobody had heard Ron call out.

"I apologize. My cloak isn't made for four." Harry pulled Ron back up, smoothing the cloak over all of them.

Apparently, a simple 'We'll take the dragon ourselves' wasn't how Charlie operated. No… They had to bring the hard-to-manage dragon up to a tower, up a flight of stairs. The only person that seemed calm was Melanie. The other three were looking around them and nudging the crate alternatively.

"Are we there yet?" Not a minute passed before Ron asked again. Finally, they managed to get to the staircase, albeit shuffling awkwardly.

"How are we supposed to get this up the stairs?" Melanie raised an eyebrow. Hermione took a step back, making it clear that she expected Harry and Ron to carry the crate up.

How they actually managed to get the crate up the stairs, none of them were sure of.

Time ticked by until, eventually, they saw four broomsticks swoop down from the sky.

"Give us heart attacks, why don't you," Hermione muttered. They helped to buckled Nobert onto a special harness and thanked the four dragon handlers. At last, Nobert was gone.

Hermione, Harry and Ron started down the stairs, Melanie trailing behind them.

"Stop," Melanie whispered. They could all just make out a slightly darker shadow at the bottom of the stairs.

_Somebody's there! We're going to be in so much trouble…_

Harry was patting his pockets, looking for his Invisibility cloak. "Looking for this?" Melanie held out the cloak. Before anybody could say anything else, Hermione and Ron were pushed together, Invisibility cloak thrown over their heads.

"Ah ha! Filthy troublemakers." Filch led Harry and Melanie to professor McGonagall's study on the first floor. They could just hear a shuffling behind them as Ron and Hermione left.

Excuses were running through Harry's mind, each crazier than the last. _We were taking a walk; I heard a sound and dragged my sister from the Hufflepuff Common Room; It's a coincidence; I got lost; I was told by an evil voice to go there. _He even considered telling the truth briefly, but ended up deciding not to say anything.

"I would never have believed it of either of you," Professor McGonagall said, towered over the two siblings. "Mr. Filch says you were up in the astronomy tower. It's one o'clock in the morning; explain yourselves."

Silence followed the question. Harry had a sudden epiphany. If they didn't talk, the worst they'd get was, probably, a detention. After all, it had to be a far stretch for the professor to guess about the true story.

The silence stretched on for ten minutes until Professor McGonagall had had enough. "Students out of bed at 1 o'clock! Both of you will receive detentions. Nothing gives you the right to walk around school at night, especially these days, it's very dangerous. Fifty points will be taken from Slytherin and Hufflepuff."

Harry grimaced. Although he'd known that fifty points would be taken, it certainly wouldn't be pleasant when the rest of his Housemates found out. Distractedly, he wondered who would win the House cup that year.

Again, there was silence. Taking the lack of response as impertinence, professor McGonagall continued. "Don't think that I'm not serious." She pinched the bridge of her nose, moving her glasses. "Now, get back to bed, both of you."

Even though Harry had been expecting this, he couldn't help feeling wretched. Something about the professor's tone resembled a parent's scolding.

**{A/N Yay… Another chapter! XD So close to being done. *looks dramatically into the distance.* Read and Review.}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	14. The Forest and The Exam

**{A/N Chapter Fourteen. I have the next few chapters written, so I'll have another one up on Monday and probably two next week as well.}**

Things weren't as bad in this 'universe.' The Slytherins, however disappointed with the loss of points, stuck to their own Housemates. They hadn't lost their lead, only losing how much they were ahead of the other Houses.

Between Snape's bad mood and Harry's question answering, they quickly made up the fifty lost points. It seemed that the Hufflepuffs didn't particularly care about the points. At least, they didn't bug Melanie about her losing fifty. They were last before that night and they were still last after.

The exams were approaching faster than any of them had expected, especially Hermione. The four of them studied until curfew in the library, retreating to their Common Rooms after to study by themselves. Although Hermione was the most prepared, she was also the most panicked. There were a few situations when they had to put aside their studying just to make sure that Hermione wouldn't have a breakdown.

Harry's suspicion of Snape grew as the time passed. Professor Quirrell looking paler and sicker as days passed, and Harry could swear that Snape was in a better mood as Quirrell deteriorated. In the time that wasn't spent studying, they tried to think of ways to stop the professor.

On the morning of Harry and Melanie's detention, they received a note from professor McGonagall.

"The Forbidden Forest?" Hermione's tone sounded shocked, worried, angry and disappointed.

"That's what it says," said Harry, taking another bite of his breakfast. He wasn't very worried about the forest as he knew what was going to happen. It seemed that when one had memories of one's alternate life, they coincided either with the present or immediate future.

"But that's dangerous! Who knows what kinds of creatures are in there?" Hermione's eyes glazed over for a second. "Centaurs for one. Please, for your health, don't call them horses."

"But they are horses." Ron looked confused.

Hermione spluttered for a minute before managing to say something coherent. "If you want to die or get maimed, go ahead and say that."

~.~.~.~.~

_Of course…_ She couldn't make anything easier on herself. Not wanting to put Hagrid in the path of Voldemort, she'd suggested that her, Harry, and Fang go one way while Hagrid goes somewhere else.

Now, as they were heading into the darker part of the forest, she was questioning her previous logic.

Darkness was swamping her senses. She hadn't even known it was possible for the dark to be so dark that it felt impossible to do anything. Melanie shivered, looking to her right to make sure that Harry was still there.

How long had it been since Hagrid's footsteps had faded? A minute? Two? An hour? Was it morning yet?

Meeting their first centaur was interesting. Thanks to Hermione's warning, both Harry and Melanie managed to stop themselves from calling the centaur a horse. That was the last friendly creature they'd seen in the forest. So far, they'd seen something slithering beside their foot, something crawling up a tree by their head, and something pouncing on something else in the distance.

Not to mention that they still had to find the creature who killed the unicorn.

Another shiver rolled up her back and Melanie reached for Fang's collar. She needed to feel something to make sure that she wasn't alone in this darkness.

Everything happened at once. Harry fell to the forest ground, clutching his scar. Fang whimpered and bolted back the way they came. The figure, Voldemort, crouching over the unicorn turned around. Luckily, Melanie had been prepared for this.

A small flame quickly spread into a burning inferno, banishing the darkness. The hooded figure was trapped behind the fire for the moment, allowing a centaur to rush in and take Harry on his back.

_WHY DO I HAVE TO RUN?_ Branches cracked under her feet, which were constantly being tripped by roots. Obviously, she had none of the centaur's forest-running abilities.

After tripping for the dozenth time, the centaur came to an abrupt stop. In front of them was a worried Hagrid.

Firenze left with some ominous words but Melanie could see him watching from behind a tree.

"Harry? Melanie? Yer all righ'?"

"We're fine." Hagrid's eyes scanned over Melanie's scratches and scrapes. "I was running through the forest."

He let out a low chuckle at that before asking, "What happened?"

"We saw a dead unicorn and something drinking its blood," said Harry, not mentioning that Firenze had, practically, told them that the figure was Voldemort. At Hagrid's questioning look, Harry pointed back where they came from. "Follow the trail of crushed grass and broken twigs."

"Well, excuse me if I can't run through the forest like a centaur…"

Hagrid led the two of them back to the castle, dismissing them from their detention on account of the fact that they'd probably been 'traumatized.'

"Harry… Firenze told you what that… thing was, right?" She hadn't been exactly paying for attention to what they were talking about, trusting it to be the same as she 'knew' it to be.

"Yeah; Voldemort."

Melanie frowned. "That poor unicorn." Once inside Hogwarts, they went in opposite directions.

_I can't sleep._ She'd been tossing and turning so much that Susan had woken up to whisper a quick, "Stop fidgeting."

_Well, studying can't do any harm._ Even with Harry's memories, there were still things that she wasn't sure of.

Melanie wasn't the only person that couldn't sleep. Harry was sitting on his Slytherin bed, rubbing his head. Something about that shadowy figure had triggered a massive headache for him.

Harry swore under his breath again, receiving a sleepy, "Language, Harry," from a tired Draco. In a bad mood, Harry chucked one of his pillows at his friend.

"What's wrong?" asked Draco.

"Headache."

"Stressing for the exam?" The blond boy pasted a mock-horrified expression on his face. "Please don't turn into a Hufflepuff, like that pathetic Abbot girl."

"My sister's a Hufflepuff."

"Yeah, well." Harry smirked, glad to see that his 'lecture' about blood purity seemed to have knock down his argument that Muggleborns were stupid. It also helped that he'd pointed out that Hermione was a Muggleborn and beating him at all the subjects.

"We are all Slytherins and we need sleep," Theodore snapped. He threw both of his pillows, one at Harry and one at Draco. Before long, it turned into a vicious fight to the death. With pillows.

~.~.~.~.~

"You really should go to the Hospital Wing, Harry." Hermione's concerned look faded as Harry directed a withering glare at her.

"No."

"Stop nagging him, Hermione," said Ron. "Honestly, even if he did go to the Hospital Wing, what could he say? 'Sorry, but I need something to stop my magical curse scar from aching because You-Know-Who is still alive and after the Philosophers Stone. Which I'm not supposed to know about, but I do. Also, did you know that I was a Gryffindor, but only in another universe?' That'll go well."

Hermione and Melanie both punched him lightly, turning around in opposite directions to make sure that nobody overheard him. Thankfully, the chatter in the Hall added up so that nobody could really hear each other.

Harry's smile quickly turned into a grimace as his scar throbbed again. Between the late-night revisions for the exams, the stress of the exams themselves, and his warnings of 'impending doom,' it really wasn't a surprise that he had headaches and scar pains.

At least his alternate memories allowed him to have to study less than others, as he knew what would be on the exams. He'd tried to hint to others what would be on the exams but Hermione had lectured him for cheating. The Ravenclaw had vehemently refused to use her other memories, being extremely irritated when an answer or two would slip through her carefully constructed 'mind-barrier,' as she liked to call it.

Harry, Ron, and Melanie had no problems with a little bit of 'cheating,' on the other hand.

_It is tempting. What would they say if I went to the Hospital Wing and said that?_ Harry pondered the question for a minute, tuning out everybody around him. He'd be able to enjoy their looks of shock before they, probably, locked him up in some magical psychiatrics' office.

"I wish I knew what this means! It's happened before but never as often as this." Harry sighed, laying his forehead on the table.

"Maybe it means that something's going to happen at the end of this year," Melanie suggested, though it sounded more like an observation or a fact than an idea.

"One more exam, and then we're free." Ron seemed completely oblivious to the fact that exams weren't their biggest problem.

Thankfully, their last exam was for History of Magic. None of them, albeit Hermione, had bothered studying. Almost nobody in the entire castle had bothered studying for that particular exam. The three knew what they were going to answer and what was wrong from those answers. Besides, History of Magic wasn't the most important subject around. Their time would be better spent doing anything else.

The exam came around, prompting more than half of the first years to frantically start reviewing (or start studying, in some cases). Complaints and groans were heard as some of them were regretting not having studied before.

"You may begin now." The sound of papers being turned over filled the classroom for a brief second, followed by the sound of quills scratching on parchment. Harry ignored the professor lecturing them about cheating.

_Hermione_... Harry noted briefly, exasperated in his thoughts. Of course, her hand was already speckled with ink. He could practically hear the thoughts racing in her mind. _And then, of course, I'd have to add another bajillion pages to secure the highest mark possible! _Harry smiled, writing down as little as possible for each question.

It was halfway through the exam when their memories, abruptly and confusingly, decided to appear.

**_~"Don't you think it's a bit odd that what Hagrid wants more than anything else is a dragon, and a stranger turns up who just happens to have an egg in his pocket?" Running from under their shady spot to Hagrid's hut, suspecting the worst but hoping for the best.~_**

**_~"Did you mention Hogwarts at all?"_**

**_"Mighta come up. Yeah, he asked what I did, an' I told him I was gamekeeper here... He asked a bit about the sorta creatures I took after..." Hagrid trying to remember what exactly happened when the hooded stranger kept buying him drinks.~_**

**_~"...So I told him, Fluffy's a piece o' cake it yeh know how to calm him down, jus' play him a bit o' music and he'll go straight off get sleep-" Hagrid's horrified expression.~_**

**_~"We want to see professor Dumbledore."_**

**_"See professor Dumbledore? Why?"_**

**_"It's sort of a secret." _**

**_"Professor Dumbledore left ten minutes ago. He received an urgent owl from the Ministry of Magic and flew off for London at once."_**

**_The conversation progressed with Harry trying to convince professor McGonagall that what he had to say was important, ending with her dropping the books in her arms in surprise.~_**

Harry groaned aloud, turning to look at the other three.

He could see Hermione, quill frozen from as she received these memories. She was whispering furiously under her breath. Harry could just make out the words, 'idiot' and 'reckless.'

Ron had actually slammed his head into his desk, seeming to have temporarily forgotten that they were in the middle of an exam.

Melanie was the only one of the four not affected. She did, however, notice that Hermione had stopped writing.

Between his groan, Hermione's muttering, and Ron's face on his desk, they now had the attention of the entire class. Briefly, the four of then shared a glance.

Hermione's muttering turned into her contemplating whether or not she got this question wrong. Ron lifted his head off his desk, looking reluctant to turn back to his exam. Melanie raised an eyebrow at Ron before returning to her work. Harry turned the page over, pretending that he just realized that here was another side.

They had planned to exit as soon as possible to discuss what they knew. What they hadn't expected was to be pulled aside by Professor McGonagall.

"I noticed that the four of you were exchanging glances throughout the exam." That wasn't entirely true. After the memories came to them, they'd all looked at each other at one point or another to try and see just how much more the other had left to finish.

When none of them said anything, Professor McGonagall continued. "We do not tolerate cheaters in our school."

_She can't really be thinking that..._ But that was exactly what the professor was accusing them of. _They don't have any proof though,_ Harry comforted himself.

"Professor, we weren't cheating." Harry winced; Ron put just a little too much emphasis on the 'we.' Even if he had spotted other students possibly sharing answers, this wasn't the time for sharing.

Professor McGonagall seemed to notice.

"Then what were you all doing, looking at each other during an examination?" No response. They sat there for another minute or two before Hermione spoke up.

"Professor, please, you have to believe me. We weren't cheating."

There was another pause in which the professor analyzed each of their expressions in turn. "Very well. You may go."

"That scared me!" exclaimed Hermione, once they were outside, under a nice, shady tree.

"Of course it would scare you, Hermione. A Ravenclaw's worst nightmare would be to get kicked out of school. I can just imagine the gossip now: 'Muggleborn Prodigy, Cheater?' "

"Oh, shut up, Ronald."

Harry raised an eyebrow. "You weren't even scared the littlest bit?"

"Well, maybe a little."

"What about you, Melanie? Melanie?" Harry followed his sister's gaze. "Is that-?"

"I think it is."

"That's not good. Do you think we'd be able to stop it?"

"Too late."

"What are you two talking about?" Hermione sounded peeved that information was being held from her. _Oh, the irony._

"An owl," was Harry's reply. Surprisingly, Ron figured it out before Hermione.

"The letter from the Ministry."

Silence took the place of their conversation as each of them tried to see further into the future they already could.

"It's insane how we know all this and we can't do anything to fix it!"

"It's too late anyways, Hermione." Ron pointed up into the sky, where they could just make out a purple figure on a broomstick.

"Should we go see Hagrid?" Hermione asked.

"Nah. He'd only end up feeling guilty for telling us how to get past Fluffy," said Ron, squinting at the gamekeeper's hut.

"Three-headed dogs are rare creatures, originating from Ireland or Greek."

"When'd you read about three-headed dogs, Hermione?" Melanie asked..

"If you'd read about them, why didn't you know about the music thing?" Ron said, sounding slightly put off.

Hermione tilted her head to the right, looking rather like a confused puppy. "I don't know?"

"How can you not know?" asked Harry.

"Hermione, you've probably read the entire library by now. It's not that farfetched to think that you forgot where you read his from."

"I remember where I've read everything, Ron."

Melanie spoke up. "Maybe you read it somewhere strange." At the other's questioning gazes, she added, "You know... Nicolas Flamel ring a bell?"

"She means the Chocolate Frog card," Harry pointed out, feeling a mixture between exasperation and amusement as the other two's faces changed to one of understanding.

"Wonder what there is protecting the Stone," pondered Ron, after a short pause.

"Well, remember what Hagrid said. There are defences from a lot of the teachers," Hermione pointed out.

"Yeah. It was Quirrel, McGonagall, Flitwick, Snape, Sprout, and Dumbledore himself." Melanie then voiced what they were all thinking. "At this point, I think it's pretty clear that we're going to go after it."

Harry's new memories hadn't exactly provided him with that information yet, but the general impression was that. He bit his lip worriedly. "You know you guys don't have to come with me, right?"

The other three stopped their debate about the possible defences to stare at him.

"Mate, you feeling okay?" asked Ron.

"Fine."

Ron, Hermione, and Melanie looked at each other before they all said, "Harry, we're coming with you."

"Don't you argue about this, Mr. Potter," said Hermione in her best strict-librarian (her best Madam Pince voice).

"Harry, I'm your sister and you can't stop me from going."

"Before you say it," said Hermione when she saw his mouth open, "just because Ron and I aren't related to you doesn't mean that you can stop us."

"Besides, safety in numbers in all that," said Ron, trying to sound overly cheerful.

**{A/N End of this chapter. I think this chapter was longer than most of my others, but more stuff is happening. Yay stuff!**

**Thanks to That Elusive Reader for two brilliant reviews. Glad you're feeling better. :D Free internet brownies for readers and reviewers (you know you want them).****}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	15. Through the Trapdoor

**{A/N Chapter Fifteen. Nearly done! :3 Still not J.K. Rowling, though. D:}**

"Seriously?" complained Ron. "Is this going to be a tradition?"

This time, it'd been Harry who stepped on Ron's foot.

"I'm sorry that my Invisibility Cloak isn't big enough to fit four people comfortably! It is a cloak!"

"Shut up," hissed Hermione. "What if somebody hears you?"

Jut as she said that, Professor Snape came from around the corner. Three hands were placed over Hermione's mouth to stifle her squeak of terror. For a heart stopping moment, it seemed like they had been found out. The professor looked around suspiciously, but upon seeing nobody, he gave a small shrug and continued down the corridor.

"That," said Melanie, "was too close."

"No kidding. Who was the one telling me to shut up? Hmm, Hermione?"

The girl in question slapped his arm. "I wasn't expecting anybody to be here!"

"Not everything that's there is here, Hermione." Harry tapped his forehead before giving a signal for them to start shuffling awkwardly once again.

Fifteen minutes of shuffling, whispering, and shushing later, they were face to face with the out of bounds door on the third floor.

"This is too simple," said Melanie. How would a simple spell, Alohomora, get them into the place where a highly desirable item was?

The others nodded their agreement, but decided not to question their good luck.

Hermione gave a sharp intake of breath as they entered the room to find Fluffy, awake and vicious. Sure enough, there was harp lying approximately where the trapdoor was.

"Harry? You have the flute, right?" Even Ron's Gryffindor courage was gone with the prospect facing a three headed dog.

"No, Ron. I was just planning on letting that thing eat us."

"Um, a question?" said Hermione. "Have you even played that thing before? Do you even know how to play a flute?"

"If not, now would be a good time to find out!" Melanie's voice got higher as she saw the dog get ready to pounce.

Thankfully, Harry seemed to be a natural for playing wooden flutes. Even if the sound wasn't particularly great or even a tune, Fluffy's eyes fluttered as soon as the note sounded.

Warily, they crept around the sleeping creature. Even asleep, it was dangerous. If the dog happened to be dreaming about hunting and lashed out at them...

"You?" Hermione's question brought Melanie back from wondering what would happen if the dog moved. Giving the flute to Hermione, Harry dropped down the trapdoor with Ron following close behind.

It was rather comical how Fluffy's eyes opened the second the 'music' stopped playing. Managing to calm herself, Hermione started the 'music' once more. The dog flopped over, sound asleep once more.

Three thuds later, the four first years were in the first part of the Stone's protection.

"We must be miles under the school," Hermione said, looking around curiously.

"It's too stuffy," complained Harry. Ron and Melanie nodded in agreement.

"Lucky this plant thing's here, really."

Hermione, Ron, and Harry froze as their 'memories' started playing again.

"Damn!" Ron pulled on the plant, only a second too late. Curiously, the plant didn't seem to want to grab Melanie or Hermione, leaving the two boys to be restrained.

"What is that, what is that?" mumbled Hermione. Her eyes glossed over as she realized what it was. "Devil's Snare. Stop moving; the more you struggle, the faster it-"

"I'm very glad you know what it's called, but could you, maybe, I don't know - HELP US?" Ron had, however, listened to Hermione. The plant seemed to start crawling lazily up his arm as he stopped moving instead of trying to actively strangle him.

"Shut up; I'm trying to remember how to kill it!"

"Well, hurry up! I can't breathe!" The tendrils joined together to try and strangle Harry.

"Um... Devil's Snare, what did professor Sprout say?"

_Come on, Hermione! You know this!_ thought Melanie. Apparently, because her memories were different, they also accelerated faster, which was extremely disorientating and made her feel déjà vu every second.

"It likes the dark and the damp; it's probably indigenous to Scotland; tentacle-like vines-"

"Hermione!" Harry's shout brought her back to reality.

"Oh, yes! Er... Dark and damp, dark and damp - OH! Melanie, fire!"

By now, the plant was so tight around Ron's chest that he couldn't make a scathing remark about how slow she was.

Carefully, Melanie conjured a small fire near Ron and Harry. The tendrils of the Devil's Snare reeled back to the floor so quickly that Melanie blinked and missed it.

"Hermione... Next time... that you-" Ron broke off into a fit of coughing, frantically trying to get the oxygen back into his lungs.

"Lucky you pay attention during Herbology, Hermione." Harry smiled at her, happy that he hadn't been strangled by a plant.

Once Harry and Ron had gotten their breath back, they continued along the only way.

When they were almost away from the Devil's Snare, one of the vines grabbed Hermione's arm.

"Oh, get off!" She slapped the plant, surprised when it retreated.

All that could be heard was a steady drip of water somewhere down the passageway, leaving them all to furiously try and access their memories better.

Tipping his head sideways, Ron cupped his ear. "Can you hear something?"

Sure enough, there was a faint rustling, accompanied by some soft clinks.

"Do you think it's a ghost?" asked Harry.

Melanie face palmed and said, "Ladies and gentlemen, the saviour of the Wizard World!"

"What?" Harry sounded indignant.

"Harry... Have you ever heard the ghosts at Hogwarts make any sound like that?" asked Hermione, raising an eyebrow.

Harry smiled sheepishly, looking away. An embarrassed pause later, Ron said, "It sounds like wings to me... And..." He closed his eyes, trying to focus on the sounds. "Metal? Glass?"

"There's light ahead - I can see something moving." Harry led the way to the end of the passageway.

Before them, there was a brightly lit chamber with arching ceilings. Flying around the room were small, brightly coloured birds. On the opposite of the room, there was their destination: a wooden door.

"Will they attack us if we go across?" Hermione asked, shielding her head with her arms.

Harry said, "Probably," the same time that Ron said, "Probably not."

They stared at each other before Ron said, "They're keys... This means that one of them should unlock that big door over here." He seemed surprised that he was the only one who noticed that (Melanie did notice but didn't say anything).

"How're we supposed to get them?" Harry's attention fell on the brooms at the wall nearby.

"Oh, please tell me we don't have to-"

"We have to," said Melanie, interrupting Hermione. "Grab a broom."

"Er, you three can fly much better than I can. Why don't you get the key? I feel much safer with both my feet planted on the ground."

"Sure," said Harry.

"Actually, Hermione, your feet are planted under the ground... This entire chamber is under the ground."

"Never knew you were one for technicalities, Ron," remarked Melanie.

Between Harry's seeking skills and the other twos' ability to fly a broom somewhat straight, Harry managed to corner the silver key.

"The poor key!" exclaimed Hermione when they were all on the ground, allowing her a good look at it. The bright, blue wings had crumpled, sorry-looking feathers. Carefully, she grabbed it so that the wings were pinned firmly, but not harshly. Even more carefully, she inserted it into the lock, pushing the door open. Hermione straightened a few of its feathers, allowing it to fly more evenly.

"Hermione, you know that the key's not actually alive, right?" Ron raised an eyebrow at her.

Hermione blushed, refusing to answer.

"At least this makes it harder to catch in case anybody needs to get through again," Harry pointed out.

The next chamber contrasted sharply with the previous one. Instead of colours moving around the room at top speed, there was a huge black and white chessboard with the black and white pieces. They were dwarfed by the nearby black pieces. The white pieces, although seen from a distance, still made them feel tiny. What was simply unnerving was how none of the chess pieces had faces but were still alive and seemed able to think.

"Now what do we do?" asked Harry although he already had a pretty good idea.

"Oh, please don't tell me-"

For the second time within ten minutes, Hermione was cut off from the same sentence. "It's obvious, isn't it?" Ron was smiling, obviously in his forte. "We're going to have to play across the room."

He walked up to a black knight, acting as if this was an everyday occurrence. "Do we, er, have to join you to get across?" The knight nodded and Ron turned to talk to the other three.

"Now don't be offended or anything, but none of you are that good at chess-"

Harry interrupted his sure to be long speech about how they shouldn't be offended with a simple, "We're not offended. Just tell us what to do."

"Besides, who knows what they might do to us if we lose," Melanie said, pointing to the chess pieces. Between the stone pieces and the fact that they were in unknown areas of Hogwarts, it wasn't hard to imagine a rather gruesome fate.

"Don't lose, Ron," Hermione said, in a very quiet voice.

"Yeah, no pressure or anything on me." He paused for a moment, surveying the board before speaking again. "Suppose we're going to have to take the place of three black pieces. Well, Harry, you take the place of that bishop and Hermione, take the castle next to him. Um... Melanie, take the bishop on the other side."

"What about you?"

"I'm going to be a knight."

The chessman appeared to have been listening, though the lack of visible ears made the four wonder how. The four chess pieces left their squares empty for the four students to fill.

"White always plays first in chess... Yes, look!" A white pawn moved forwards two squares, obscuring their view of the door on the other side.

This was a side of Ron they'd never seen before. Usually, when they versed him in chess, he'd be laughing and joking and handicapping himself so the games wouldn't be over too quickly. Now, he was a calm leader, ordering the black pieces around the board. The only times he showed any emotion was his breaths of relief when he managed to save them from being taken by the white pieces.

If they'd ever thought that wizard's chess was violent, they were dead wrong. This was violence, up close and terrifying. Chess pieces smashed onto each other eagerly, loud cracking sounds echoing around the large room. Completely contradicting their memories, Ron didn't even look shaken when the knight was smashed face down and dragged off the board. He just calmly ordered Hermione to take another piece.

"We're nearly there... Let me think..." His eyes traveled across the board. Ron smiled when he saw an opportunity, but bit his lip.

"So that's me and..." His eyes landed on Melanie, who was engaged in a staring contest with the eyeless white queen. "Melanie?"

She looked up at the sound of the sound of her name. From the way that Ron kept looking between her and the white knight, she figured out what was happening pretty quickly.

"Where?" she asked. The other two hadn't caught on yet but were sure to soon.

"Three diagonal, up and left."

Even if Hermione wasn't great at chess, she knew the basics. "But that'll put her in the path of..."

"No!" Harry shouted. He almost stepped off his square, stopping only when Ron held his hand out.

"It's the only way! We've got to be taken," said Ron, pointing at himself and a surprised Melanie.

"We?"

At Ron's nod, Harry and Hermione simultaneously shouted, "NO!"

"That's chess-" Ron's explanation was cut off as Melanie stepped to her designated square.

_This is going to hurt..._ Everything happened in slow motion, an effect of her sudden rush of adrenaline. She had a sudden flight instinct; there was no way that she could fight against that stone piece. Forcing herself to stay still, she tensed her arms and legs to make sure that she wouldn't involuntarily step away.

A white blur was what she registered before her vision turned black.

**{A/N End of another chapter. I think it's two more chapters. Thanks to everybody who's reading. :D A special thanks to the faithful reviewer, That Elusive Reader. I hope you all enjoy what I'm writing and I certainly enjoy knowing that somebody's reading it.}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	16. Confrontation

**{A/N Chapter Sixteen. Soooo closeeeeee. On a different topic, does anybody have any ideas for HP oneshots I could write? I can't really think of anything and I want to try writing some. **

**Thanks once again to That Elusive Reader for a stupendous review! :D I feel like we're just competing for synonyms now… Now that you mention the Professor/professor thing, I can just feel my eye twitching out of annoyance that I didn't fix that. But I'm so lazy… D: [[[EDIT: I went back and fixed them, yay!]]] Anyways, onto the actual story. }**

_That's a hell of a headache..._

Instead of drifting in blackness, Melanie could feel the cold, hard ground under her. She shifted slightly so that her arms weren't being crushed by her body anymore. Melanie lay there for a moment before she thought, _Wait, why am I still lying here?_

"Harry," she muttered, sitting up. Her eyes snapped open at the same time and a wave of nausea washed over her. Groaning, she drew her knees up to will the nausea away.

The light seemed blinding from having her eyes closed for so long and it took her a minute to get her bearings.

Littered around her were still, black chess pieces. They didn't look too battered but were probably still shaky from being punching bags for the white pieces. _Why am I thinking this? They're not alive. _Hermione was definitely getting to her with the flying key incident.

Before she could do anything else, Hermione spoke as she entered the room. "Melanie? You're awake?"

"No, I've just been possessed by a chess demon. How's Ron?"

"Still unconscious." Hermione bit her lip, obviously worried.

Melanie stood up and staggered over. Thankfully, Ron was still breathing.

"Well, he was knocked out by the queen rather than a knight; maybe that has something to do with it."

"Yah, may- Wait, how do you know he was taken out by the queen?"

"Um... That's not important now. Where's Harry?" Hermione gestured to the door. "You let him go by himself?"

"Of course not!" came the indignant reply. "We saw a troll - thank god it was knocked out - and then we got to Snape's part. There was a riddle and a bunch of bottles and there was only enough of the potion for him to go!"

Melanie nodded. "You stay here."

"What?" Melanie's response was to point at the door. "You can't go!"

"I have to. He's my brother." With that, the redhead turned around and dashed through the door. She heard footsteps behind her, pacing around Ron.

"Ugh! Troll smell!" She covered her face with part of her robe, trying to keep her balance and run through as quickly as possible. Being knocked unconscious by a magical, stone chess piece wasn't the best way to improve one's balance.

As soon as she stepped into the next room, a purple fire sprung up from behind her, followed a second later by a black one at the other door.

A roll of parchment was lying next to the row of bottles. Once she read it through, she felt despair. She knew which bottle held the correct potion, but there wasn't enough left in it.

"What do I do?" Melanie paced frantically, watching the door in case it somehow became unblocked.

"How am I supposed I get through before Harry..." She couldn't finish her sentence, but her mind helpfully supplied the words. ._..gets hurts or worse_. Even if she knew that Dumbledore would be here soon, it would be too close.

What if he didn't get there fast enough?"

"Honestly, how am I supposed to get through? And while I'm pacing and talking, Harry's on the other side of the-" Melanie stopped abruptly.

"Fire! I'm so stupid!"

Confidently, she walked up to the fire and held out a hand. Stifling a yelp, she took her hand back. This was the closest that she'd ever been to being burned. Her skin was red from the heat, feeling rather tingly.

Usually, fire would feel warm, but this was hot. Really hot. But she had to save Harry.

"Here I come..." She stepped forward, into the black fire.

If she could ignore the small prickles of pain when it almost felt like burning, being in the fire was almost relaxing. She could feel the raw power of this fire, the power that was missing from normal fire. It was tempting to just stand there, but the idea of Harry in danger drove her out of the safety of the fire.

"What?!"

In front of her were Harry and Quirrell. Or more specifically, the back of Quirrell. Where there should've been hair on the back of his head, there was the face of a psychopathic murderer: Voldemort. All the memories in the world couldn't have prepared for that sight.

_Well, that was unexpected. At least it would've been if I hadn't already known that._

"Ah... Harry Potter and Melanie Potter... The family united here, to die."

Harry took a step towards Melanie, gripping her forearm. "Why are you here?"

"Couldn't let you die alone, brother dear." Harry growled, obviously not happy with the idea of her dying.

"See what I have become?" Even if Voldemort's voice was merely a whisper, it drifted across the room and into the ears of the two Potters. "Mere shadow and vapour... I have form only when I can share another's body... but there have always been those willing to let me into their hearts and minds... Unicorn blood has strengthened me, these past weeks... you saw faithful Quirrell drinking it for me in the forest... and once I have the Elixir of Life, I will be able to create a body of my own... Now... why don't you give me that Stone in your pocket?"

Harry took another step back, pulling Melanie behind him.

"You idiot! I'm not a child, and you're the one with the priceless artefact." Melanie pulled Harry back, switching their positions.

"Don't be a fool... Better save your life and join me... or you'll meet the same end as your parents... They died begging me for mercy..."

"LIAR!" shouted Harry, making Melanie jump.

"Out parents wouldn't beg vermin like you." Melanie had no idea where the sudden courage came from, but she made use of it.

Now, Quirrell was walking backwards toward them, looking rather odd.

"How touching... I always value bravery... Yes, your parents were brave... I killed your father first; and he put up a courageous fight... but your mother needn't have died... she was trying to protect her children... Now, give me the Stone unless you want her to have died in vain..."

Harry shook his head, using his common sense to not shout out at Voldemort again.

Quirrell turned slightly, directing his master's gaze at Melanie. "You stand there beside a murderer... No? You shake your head? Look at me... See what your brother... has done to me... A mere child... murderer of an adult."

"I wish he murdered you properly!"

For a second, Voldemort looked slightly taken aback. His face twisted into one of malicious intent. "I've told you that I admire courage... You are courageous and loyal... unlike some rats in this world... You... would make a good Death Eater..."

Melanie raised an eyebrow. Did he really think that she would be won over so easily? Hadn't he just spoken of her loyalty?

"You shake your head... but think... What can be offered to you as a normal wizard? A girl... bottom of her class... bottom of every class... overshadowed by a famous brother... What can you do that he can't? And ten times better."

Melanie shivered. Voldemort had just dredged up some of her insecurities. For a second, only a second, she was tempted. Dark magic would be able to improve her in ways that normal magic couldn't. Combined with her fire magic, she'd be _powerful_.

But…

"Never!"

As if that was a cue, both of them sprinted towards the exit.

"SEIZE HIM!" Melanie felt a mix of emotions; rage that Harry was in danger, fear that they wouldn't be making out of the room, relief that Quirrell wasn't trying to grab her, and guilt for feeling relief.

She knew what was going to happen before it did, so when Quirrell stepped back with a burned hand, Melanie stopped next to Harry.

"Seize him! SEIZE HIM!" Quirrell protested pitifully, in pain, and Voldemort's answer was for the other man to pull out a wand.

By this point, Harry had figured out what was happening, as well as that they would die if something didn't happen. He exchanged a quick glance with Melanie, leaping forwards and grabbing Quirrell/Voldemort's head.

Quickly, everything turned to chaos. Quirrell screamed in pain, and Voldemort's orders to kill them growing louder and louder.

_I have to do this carefully_. Melanie pulled out her wand, yelled, 'Incendio!" (which did nothing) and added to Quirrell's burns with her fire.

Between the two sources of heat, the man was dead in seconds.

"Mel?"

She nodded. "You?"

Harry shrugged, looking back at Quirrell's body. "Is he really...?"

Shakily, Melanie nodded. Just then, the adrenaline high (Melanie's second one of the day) wore off. The two collapsed onto the floor, exhausted, just missing the panicked shouts from Professor Dumbledore.

~.~.~.~.~

Melanie woke up, very un-dramatically compared to her recent adventures. She simply opened her eyes, blinking repeatedly to get rid of her sleepiness.

"Good morning." Melanie started. Professor Dumbledore was sitting between her and Harry's beds, though it was clear that his main concern was Harry.

"Good morning, professor. Um... How long have I been here in the Hospital Wing?"

He looked faintly surprised that she recognized that this was the Hospital Wing. Before he could respond, Harry reached up towards his face.

"Snitch..." Harry mumbled, trying to grab Dumbledore's glasses.

"Good morning, Harry." Melanie couldn't help but notice how Harry was addressed by name.

Harry stared at him for a moment before blurting out, "Sir! The Stone! It was Quirrell! He's..." Harry stopped, gulping.

"Calm yourself, dear boy." Harry was dear, and she wasn't even Melanie.

"Sir, I... Quirrell he, Voldemort!"

"Harry, please relax, or Madam Pomfrey will have me thrown out."

Harry finally calmed down, looking over at Melanie. When it was assured that she was, indeed, fine. His gaze then went around the room at the various presents and cards from the students of Hogwarts. Ron, Hermione, Fred, George... Some from a few Gryffindors that knew Ron, even some from Draco, Theodore and Blaise.

"Tokens from your friends and admirers." That was when Melanie stopped listening. She knew, mostly, what Dumbledore was going to say.

Flexing her arms and legs, she was relieved that there didn't seem to be any major problems. She was simply tired, though fighting a Dark Lord might do that to her. Her head was, as predicted, aching.

"Yeah, Melanie found out about Nicolas Flamel. But that means he and his wife will die, won't they?" Melanie looked up when Harry mentioned her.

Harry and Melanie looked at each other. Three people dead within a few days, partly because of them.

And this was just their first year at Hogwarts.

The professor smiled sympathetically and said, "They have enough Elixir stored to set their affairs in order and then, yes, they will die. To one as young as you, I'm sure it seems incredible, but to Nicolas and Perenelle, it really is like going to bed after a very, very long day. After all, to the well-organized mind, death is but the next greatest adventure. You know, the Stone was really not such a wonderful thing. As much money and life as you could want! The two things most human beings would choose above all - the trouble is, humans do have a knack of choosing precisely those things that are worse for them."

Melanie waited for Dumbledore to stop talking before asking, "Going to sleep after a very long day? Usually, people wake up."

The headmaster smiled and nodded. "When one is weary and old, sleeping for eternity does not sound like a concern."

Another silence filled the Hospital Wing, only to be broken by Harry. "Sir? I've been thinking... Sir, even if the Stone's gone, Vol- I mean You-Know-Who-"

"Call him Voldemort, Harry. Always use the proper name for things. Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself."

_He's like a bloody fountain of wisdom..._

"Yes, sir. Well, Voldemort's going to try other ways of coming back, isn't he?"

**_A black diary. Ancient, yellow eyes. Large, slithering snake._**

**_Escaped rat. Escaped convict._**

**_Tournament with a maze. Trophy for the winner. Graveyard._**

For once, it wasn't images or words that appeared in Melanie's mind; it was a vague impression of something. She could still see and hear everything around her, but the 'impressions' took over most of her attention.

She shivered, fearing what was yet to come. Maybe she had these memories so she could save Harry.

"Harry! Melanie!"

Melanie reared back, not having realized that she'd spaced out for so long.

"We were sure you were going to- Dumbledore was so worried-"

"The whole school's talking about it," said Ron, much to Harry's surprise. "What really happened?"

"How does gossip travel around so fast at Hogwarts?" asked Harry, mainly to himself.

"Well, I'm glad to see that you two have managed to avoid killing each other during the time that we've been incapacitated," said Melanie, smirking when the two of them started launching into stories of them fighting.

"Anyways," said Hermione, cutting off Ron in the middle of him informing them that Hermione had to be the bossiest, most stuck-up girl in the whole world. "We're here to hear what actually happened." Then, she rounded on Melanie. "Don't you ever do that again, leaving me with Ron and running off after some dangerous wizard!"

"Yes, mother." There was a stunned silence. Melanie tilted her head to the right, confused. Where had she even gotten that saying from? It's not like she ever called her aunt 'mother.'

Still slightly stunned from what Melanie said, Harry launched into his story. Melanie filled in what he didn't know, amazing Hermione when she said that she simply walked through the fire.

"That reminds me," Hermione said, narrowing her eyes, "how did you know that Ron was knocked out by the queen?"

Melanie was saved from having to explain her messed-up memories when Madam Pomfrey walked back into the room.

"Out!" When they protested, she continued with, "I said five minutes and it's been nearly fifteen! Out now, or neither of them will be allowed to go the Feast."

And that was that.

**{A/N One more chapter!}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


	17. End of a Year

**{A/N Chapter Seventeen. Thanks to That Elusive Reader for another review! :D That's an interesting way to come up with ideas. I'll try it when I get some inspiration. XD}**

The Great Hall was decked out in green and silver in honour of Slytherin winning the House cup. Professor McGonagall, along with all the non-Slytherins (except for Ron, Hermione, and Melanie), were extremely put out.

Nobody could, however, deny that Harry deserved the 50 extra points rewarded yesterday. The story of how he'd gotten those points weren't entirely true, but everybody seemed to know that it had something to do with saving something on the forbidden floor.

These points didn't actually do anything, considering that Melanie, Hermione, and Ron also received fifty points each.

Still, a plus side was that it made up for the fifty points that Harry and Melanie had lost in the Norbert incident.

"Another year gone! And I must trouble you with an old man's wheezing waffle before we sink our teeth into our delicious feast. What a year it has been!" Was it Harry's imagination, or was Dumbledore staring at him when he said that? "Hopefully, your heads are all a little fuller than they were... you have the whole summer ahead to get them nice and empty before next year starts."

"Ron's never needs much emptying," whispered Hermione.

"Hey!" came the indignant reply.

"Now, as I understand it, the house cup needs awarding, and the points stand thus. In fourth place, Gryffindor, with three hundred and fourty-three points." Even if 150 points weren't taken from Gryffindor, they had the Weasley twins and no Hermione to balance it out.

"In third, Hufflepuff, with three hundred and fifty-two. Ravenclaw has four hundred and twenty-six and Slytherin, four hundred and seventy-two."

The Slytherin table broke out in cheers and applause, lifting goblets into the air.

This time around, there was no awarding of last minute points. There was nothing to destroy the enthusiasm of the snakes. Eventually, even the other Houses couldn't resist joining in on the infectious cheering, though one could tell that their cheers were promises that this would be the last year that Slytherin won.

The Feast was fun (though perhaps not as much as when one wins the House cup for their House with their friends), but before Harry knew it, the year was over.

The exam results were expected, with Ron, Melanie, and Harry get better marks than most of the first years. Hermione, obviously, received marks higher than humanly possible ("How is it even possible to get 130 percent in Charms?"). All the first years had scraped through, good marks making up for abysmal ones.

Their memories of the other 'universe' had mainly faded, though Harry wasn't sure that they were actually gone. He hoped that they would resurface for next years exams, though.

Wardrobes were empty within the next week or so, trunks were packed, notes were handed out to students reminding them not to perform magic over the summer.

Hagrid took the first years back across the lake in a fleet of rowboats.

They found an empty compartment on the Hogwarts Express, joined by Neville and Draco. The two seemed at ease in the company of everybody else in the compartment except each other.

"I can't believe the year's over already!" Harry sighed, not looking forward to a summer of neglect and labour with the Dursleys.

As if reading his mind, Ron said, "You must come and stay this summer, all three of you- I'll send an owl."

"Thanks, we'll need something to look forward to."

As they were swept by the crowd out towards the gate to the Muggle world, people were heard wishing Harry a happy summer. Neville and Draco had been taken aside by guardians, waving one last time as the four were squeezed through the brick wall.

"I'll never get used to that!" exclaimed Melanie, calming her agitated cat. "Ash, calm down."

"There he is, mom, there he is, look!" The youngest Weasley jumped up and down with excitement at seeing the famous Harry Potter.

"Harry Potter! Look, mom! I can see-"

"Be quiet, Ginny, and it's rude to point." Instantly, the young girl shut up, blushing scarlet as she realized that Harry Potter was walking nearby her.

"Busy year?"

"Very!" the four said at once. They exchanged smiles; trolls and Voldemort in their first year.

_Joy..._

"Thank you for the fudge and sweater, Mrs. Weasley."

Melanie lifted an eyebrow, not having received either. Mrs. Weasley noticed and turned slightly pink. "Oh, it was nothing, dear."

"Ready, are you?"

Harry sighed, but turned around with a pleasant smile. That was a voice he hadn't heard the entire year and never wanted to hear again.

_But you can't have everything in life,_ was what he thought when Uncle Vernon walked off towards the car.

"See you over the summer."

"Hope we can do anything this summer, huh, Harry?" Melanie said, anticipating their treatment.

"Hope you have a good holiday?" Hermione looked uncertainly towards the car where Uncle Vernon was.

Struck by a sudden idea, Harry grinned. "Oh, I will." At the puzzled looks he received, he said, "They don't know that we're not allowed to use magic at home. I'm going to have a lot of fun with Dudley this summer..."

And suddenly, the summer didn't seem like such a bad thing anymore. If only he knew.

**{A/N Shortest chapter yet. ;.; But, since it was the last chapter, it'll be fine XD Seems more like an epilogue that an actual chapter. Whoops?**

**I can't believe I'm actually done this fanfiction.**

**The next year, "The Potter Twins and the Not-so-Secret Chamber" will be up sometime soon. I'm expecting more Hermione and Ron POVs in that, since Harry already has a book on his second year and Melanie… Well, you'll see about her later.}**

**~ScaleneGalleons~**


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